Frances Yeend

American lyric soprano Frances Yeend (1918 - ) was born in Vancouver, Washington. She studied voice at Washington State University in Pullman, Washington. Her first New York appearances were in 1943 in the Broadway run of Lehar's The Merry Widow with Jan Kiepura and Marta Eggerth. She joined Columbia Artists Management in 1944 and performed Micaela in a U.S tour of Bizet's Carmen that Columbia booked that fall. In April of 1946 Ms. Yeend made her first appearance as the soprano soloist in Beethoven's Ninth Symphony with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Serge Koussevitzky. The following summer she performed the role of Ellen Orford in the American premiere of Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes at the Tanglewood Music Festival. Yeend went on to become one of the members of the Bel Canto Trio with Mario Lanza and George London. Her debut with the New York City Center Opera was as Violetta in Verdi's La traviata in 1948. Other roles there, over the next twelve years, included, Amelia in Menotti's Amelia Goes to the Ball, Countess in Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro, Marguerite in Gounod's Faust, Eva in Wagner's Die Meistersinger, Micaela in Carmen, Felice in Wolf Ferrari's The Four Ruffians, the title role in Verdi's Aida, Nedda in Leoncavallo's Pagliacci, the title roles in Puccini's Tosca and Turandot as well as Mimi in his La Boheme and all the soprano roles in Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann. Yeend made her debut with the Vienna Staatsoper in 1953 in La traviata. She debuted at London's Covent Garden that same year as Mimi in La Boheme. In 1958 Yeend sang the title role of Puccini's Turandot at the Arena di Verona in Italy. She made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Chrysothemis in Richard Strauss's Elektra in 1961. Other Met roles included Violetta in La traviata and Gutrune in Wagner's Götterdämerung. Yeend appeared as soloist with major orchestras more than 300 times. She was a regular with the New York Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony, the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Boston Symphony. She appeared extensively in recitals in the U. S., Canada and Europe. She recorded for RCA, Columbia, Mercury, MGM, and DaVinci Records. In 1966 Ms.Yeend joined the faculty of West Virginia University as Professor of Voice and Artist in Residence. She retired in 1978.