Ellen Beach Yaw

, p. 194. ISBN 978-0-385-42174-4]

Life and career

Yaw was born in the small town of Boston, near Buffalo, New York (not Boston, Massachusetts, as is often stated), [ [http://www.townofboston.com/historical_info.html Description from "The Boston Historical Society" website] ] the daughter of Ambrose Yaw, who manufactured cow and sheep bells. Her family moved to Los Angeles when she was very young, but her father died when she was a small child, and the family was very poor. Yaw began singing and composing songs as a child. She studied singing in America, first with her mother; then with Mrs. Torpadie, the wife of tenor Theodore Bjorksten; and then with Ernesto delle Salle."Strand Magazine" interview with Yaw, June 1899, quoted in Walters] Yaw sang in concerts, beginning as a child in the 1880s, to make money to pay for singing lessons. Tours of the southern United States, California, England, Switzerland, and Germany followed, and on her return to America she gave a concert in Carnegie Hall in 1896. Yaw raised enough money through these concerts to study in Paris with Mathilde Marchesi and later coached with Alberto Randegger. She also sang several opera roles in the late 1890s, including Ophelia in Ambroise Thomas' "Hamlet" in Nice in 1897.

The Rose of Persia

In 1898 and 1899, Yaw was singing in private concerts in London, and at one of these, at the home of Mrs. Fanny Ronalds, she so impressed Sir Arthur Sullivan that he prevailed upon the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company to cast her as the Sultana Zubedyah in his comic opera "The Rose of Persia", which opened on November 29 1899 at the Savoy Theatre in London. Sullivan went so far as to write a special high cadenza for her song "'Neath My Lattice," a cadenza that only she could sing. Yaw's first two nights were shaky, though the reviews were mixed, [Walters reproduces a large number of these reviews, which range from amazed admiration to disdain, but most mention that the audience was thrilled by Yaw's high notes. Her acting was generally described as amateurish but graceful and charming.] and both the music director, Francois Cellier, and Mrs. Carte advocated for her replacement. Sullivan at first agreed, writing in his diary on 2nd December, "I told [Cellier] I was afraid [that Yaw] would not improve, that she hadn’t got it in her.... I don’t quite see what it’s all about — Miss Yaw is not keeping people out of the theatre as Cellier and the Cartes imply." [http://math.boisestate.edu/gas/rose/html/two_sultanas.html Article on Yaw, Jay and "The Rose of Persia" casting] ]

By December 10th, however, he wrote in his diary that Yaw was "improving rapidly" and "sang the song really superbly: brilliant. So I wrote again to Mrs. Carte saying that I thought if we let Miss Yaw go it would be another mistake." It was too late, however, and the next day Yaw stopped at Sullivan's flat to tell him that she had been dismissed summarily by Mrs. Carte (ostensibly on account of illness). She was replaced by Isabel Jay.

Opera and concert career

Yaw made some grand opera appearances thereafter in Monte Carlo, including as Ophelia in Thomas' "Hamlet" in 1902 (her favorite role); Rome, where she sang the title role in "Lucia di Lammermoor" in 1905 (under the name of Elena Elvanna at the Quirinal Theatre - she was the first American singer to make a successful operatic debut in Rome); Naples; Catalonia; and Milan. Yaw sang Gilda in "Rigoletto" in London in 1905 and gave a single performance of "Lucia di Lammermoor" at New York's Metropolitan Opera on March 21 1908 (after which she was described by the Met's manager as "the world’s greatest coloratura soprano). She sang a total of about 18 operatic roles.Walters] However, she mostly devoted herself to the concert hall, where she had a long and successful career, singing for many of the crowned heads of Europe and for U.S. President William McKinley. In 1904, the "Los Angeles Daily Times" wrote, "Miss Yaw's voice is high soprano of crystalline lightness and purity and of a range so extreme in altitude that... it was the wonder of the European continent." [ [http://www.ulwaf.com/LA-1900s/04.02.html "Los Angeles Times" article dated February 13, 1904] ]

Yaw was much in demand as a recording artist, and her first records were made in May 1899. She made many recordings for the Victor Talking Machine Company. In order to display her voice to its best effect, she wrote several songs of her own with titles such as "The Skylark," "The Cuckoo," and "The Firefly." News dispatches from Paris in 1902 reported that the Shah of Persia had engaged Yaw to sing her repertoire into his phonograph. A few of her recordings are still available. [ [http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/albumList.jsp;jsessionid=193B227D07FAC0C7C6B6BF6CC56BB4EE?name_id1=13281&name_role1=1&bcorder=1 Recordings available online] ] Some of her rare KeenoPhone and unpublished Edison and Victor recordings are preserved on a recording that is narrated by her pupil, the tenor Antonio Altamirano. [The recording was available from Merritt Sound Recording, 223 Grimsby Road, Buffalo, N.Y. 14223. It is not known whether it is still available.] Thomas Edison, inventor of the phonograph, recorded her voice for mechanical experiments on a visit to his Orange, New Jersey laboratories. She sang various songs throughout her range into several machines. Afterwards, Edison said of her voice, "I can see no defects of any kind in this voice. Sweet on lower notes, and mellow. Best high tones yet for the disc machine."

Later life and charitable activities

. Yaw is memorialized in Covina by Lark Ellen Elementary School and Lark Ellen Avenue, one of the main thoroughfares in the town.

She reportedly wrote her memoirs, "The Song of the Lark", which Mr. Altimirano reported were finished in 1983, but they were never published. Altimirano died in 1986, and the memoirs have not been found.

Yaw died in Covina, California, just shy of her 78th birthday.

Notes

References

*Walters, Michael. "Madame Ellen Beach Yaw" in "Daly's Issue" 1, Gaiety Publications (2002), Ed. Roderick Murray, pp. 29-38.
* [http://math.boisestate.edu/gas/whowaswho/Y-Z/YawEllenBeach.htm Ellen Beach Yaw] at Who Was Who in the D'Oyly Carte
* [http://pinafore.www3.50megs.com/eb-yaw.html Profile of Yaw]
* [http://www.ulwaf.com/LA-1900s/04.02.html Newspaper article on Yaw from 1904]

External links

* [http://ftp.rootsweb.com/pub/usgenweb/dc/newspapers/wp3feb1896-2-4.txt Review of a Yaw concert in 1896]
* [http://www.paulnoll.com/Oregon/Lark-Ellen/index.html Information about Yaw's Home for Boys]
* [http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/albumList.jsp;jsessionid=193B227D07FAC0C7C6B6BF6CC56BB4EE?name_id1=13281&name_role1=1&bcorder=1 Recordings featuring Yaw]
* [http://www.symposiumrecords.co.uk/pls/dad_generic/sym_cddets?p_cdnos=1318 Another recording featuring Yaw]
* [http://www.gilbertandsullivanonline.com/record.htm Offers another recording featuring Yaw]
* [http://www.historicopera.com/jearly_other_usa_page1.htm Information about Yaw's vocal range]