She made her _debut_ in 1866, at Prague, and ten years later sang the
small _roles_ of the first Rhine maiden and the forest bird in
"Rheingold" and "Siegfried," at the Bayreuth festival--little
fancying, perhaps, that she would twelve years later be the queen of
German opera in America. She takes excellent care of her voice, and
never allows the weather to interfere with her daily walk of several
miles. Her versatility is extraordinary, for she sings _Norma_ and
_Valentine_ as well as she does _Isolde_. She scouts the idea that
Wagner's music ruins the voice, agreeing on this point with the most
famous vocal teacher of the day, Madame Marchesi. It is only when
Wagner's music is sung to excess that it injures the voice, according
to Fraeulein Lehmann, because it requires such extraordinary power to
cope with the orchestra. Heretofore she has not always succeeded in
holding her own against the full orchestra, but in her latest and
greatest impersonation--_Bruennhilde_, in "Die Goetterdaemmerung"--her
voice rivalled Materna's in power without losing a shade of its
sensuous beauty, which is always enchanting.
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