Jennie Tourel American mezzo of Russian origin Date of Birth: 22.06.1900 Country: USA

1. American Mezzo of Russian Descent
2. European Opera Career
3. Accomplishments and Later Years

American Mezzo of Russian Descent

Jennie Tourel was an American opera and concert singer, mezzo-soprano, and vocal teacher. She was born Jennie Davidovich on June 22, 1900, in Vitebsk, which was then part of the Russian Empire and now belongs to Belarus. In her childhood, she learned to play the flute and later took piano lessons. After the October Revolution, her family, who were Belarusian Jews, left Russia and settled in the vicinity of Danzig. Later, they moved to Paris, where Jennie continued her piano studies with the intention of pursuing a career as a concert performer. She then began taking voice lessons from Reynaldo Hahn, the son of a Venezuelan mother and a German Jew, who had become a renowned pianist and composer in Paris. Her second teacher was Anna El-Tour, a Russian singer and vocal coach who had also left her homeland after the revolution. From that moment, Jennie decided to dedicate her life to the craft of a professional singer. Anna El-Tour had such a strong influence on Jennie that she even took her stage name in her honor, simply reversing the syllables of her surname. However, she later denied this fact.

European Opera Career

Jennie's European opera debut took place in 1931 at the Russian Opera in Paris when she was already quite mature for a singer, even by today's standards. On April 9, 1933, she made her debut at the Opéra-Comique in Paris, performing the role of Carmen. In the 1930s, Tourel performed at the same venue as Jacqueline in Charles Gounod's comic opera "Le médecin malgré lui," as well as the lead roles in Ambroise Thomas' "Mignon" and Georges Bizet's "Djamileh." She also portrayed Charlotte in "Werther" and Marcellina in "The Marriage of Figaro." Tourel's American debut took place in 1930 at the Civic Opera House in Chicago, where she performed in Ernest Moret's opera "Lorenzacci." She made her Metropolitan Opera debut in May 1937, singing the role of Mignon. However, her career at the Met was short-lived as the competition was too fierce. Although she appeared several times on the Met stage in the 1940s as Rosina, Adalgisa, and Carmen, she never became a permanent member of the company. Tourel managed to leave France just before the Nazi occupation and reached the United States through Lisbon. She joined the Met company in 1943-1945 and again in 1946-1947. In 1946, Jennie became a naturalized American citizen.

Accomplishments and Later Years

In 1951, Tourel became the first performer of the role of Baba the Turk in the world premiere of Igor Stravinsky's "The Rake's Progress" in Venice. Additionally, she was the first to sing certain songs by Leonard Bernstein, including the song cycles "I Hate Music" (1943) and "La Bonne Cuisine" (1949), as well as works by Francis Poulenc and Paul Hindemith. Later in her career, Tourel mainly focused on concert performances, with a preference for French repertoire. She also taught at the Juilliard School of Music in New York City and the Aspen School of Music in Colorado. Her last operatic performance was as Donna Marta in the world premiere of Thomas Pasatieri's opera "Black Widow" at the Seattle Opera in 1972. Jennie Tourel passed away on November 23, 1973, in New York City.