Word: mattiwilda
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...house lights dimmed on La Scala's gilt and maroon, and the packed audience sat back to size up an unprecedented debutante: Coloratura Soprano Mattiwilda Dobbs, 27, of Atlanta, Ga., the first Negro ever to win a principal role at La Scala...
...Mattiwilda was born the fifth of six daughters of John W. Dobbs, an Atlanta railway mail clerk who is also a vice-chairman of Georgia's Republican State Central Committee. Her name was concocted from those of her maternal grandmother (Mattie Wilda), and she sees no reason to change it: "People usually remember it." She sang solos in Atlanta's First Congregational Church as a youngster, went from that to music studies at Atlanta's Spelman College. In 1946 she shipped off to Manhattan to study voice, but prudently supplemented her musical training with teaching credits, took...
...never believe anything until it happens," says Mattiwilda Dobbs. But she is already scheduled to sing the big coloratura role in Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos at the Glyndebourne Festival next summer. Her records of Mozart's Zaide (Poly-music) and Bizet's Pearl Fishers (Renaissance) are winning top notices. Impresario Sol Hurok, who is bringing her back to the U.S. next season, has his eye fixed on the Metropolitan for Mattiwilda...