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Sara Elizabeth Flower (21 October 1820 – 20 August 1865)[1] was a British-born contralto singer who became Australia's first opera star. She began a musical career in London in the 1840s but left for Australia late in 1849. In 1852, she appeared in Sydney in the first production in Australia of Bellini's opera Norma.[2]

This article's tone or style may not reflect the encyclopedic tone used on Wikipedia. (April 2010)

Origins

Flower was born in Grays, Essex, an English market town on the River Thames at the edge of the Tilbury marshes. In 1821, Grays had a population of 742, supporting six public houses.[3] Flower's maternal grandfather, Daniel Granger, owned the Rising Sun public house. However, the strongest influence on regional music was the nearby Belmont Castle.[4]

Sara's father, William Lewis Flower (c.1800-1847), was recorded in the Essex Directory in 1823 as a draper, grocer, and agent for Phoenix Fire & Life. In 1841, when his daughter was admitted to the Royal Academy of Music,[5] he could declare that he had 'no occupation' in order to claim the status of gentleman. Sara's uncle, Robert Flower (1779?-1832), was by 1824 foreman of the local brick works but had been described in the parish records in 1817 as a yeoman, which suggests an earlier lineage of tenant farmers or small proprietors, and also a drop in social status. With the enclosure movement after the Napoleonic Wars, conditions for this socio-economic group were particularly difficult, which probably explains Robert's change in purported occupation.[6]

Her mother, Ruth Flower, was the daughter of Grays publican, Daniel Granger. Nothing more is known of her, except for the possibility that she may have been the prototype in Alice Diehl's first published novel Garden of Eden for the mother of a fictional opera singer whose sad fate she prophetically foretells.[7]

Sara was not the only professional singer in the family. Her elder sister, the soprano Elizabeth Flower, also became a public singer. Each sister had developed a considerable concert career in the 1840s, performing regionally as well as in London, often as a duo, to much acclaim, especially for Sara, with her startling[8] voice. In 1847, Elizabeth married a prominent lawyer, Timms Augustine Sargood and withdrew from public life. However, in the 1860s at their home in London's Bloomsbury district (Gordon Square), she and her husband were the hosts of a musical circle including Alice Diehl which Elizabeth recounted in two autobiographical works.

Sara and Elizabeth were frequently confused with the daughters of political writer Benjamin Flower, Sarah Fuller Flower Adams and Eliza Flower, acclaimed as poet and composer respectively. It was a confusion which persisted throughout Sara's life and afterward.[9] No connection between the two families has ever been established, but there were some similarities in economic, social, and regional backgrounds.

Education and training

From late October 1841, Sara Flower was trained at the Royal Academy of Music (R.A.M) under Domenico Crivelli(1794–1857). It was thought that Domenico was educated by his father, the singer Gaetano Crivelli (1774–1836),[10] in techniques of Italian castrati, such as the exploitation of falsetto, which could account for Flower's protean ability to cross the entire range of the operatic singing voice, as in Bellini's Norma, from the dramatic soprano of Norma to the mezzo of Analgias, in addition to the tenor role of Pollioni. She also performed baritone roles, including yodeling songs which reportedly delighted provincial colonial audiences.

Early career

Flower first came to public notice within the Psalmody Movement[11] of the 1830s and 40s in London. The Movement in Britain was associated with such names as Sarah Ann Glover, John Hullah and John Curwen. It had strong Independent, or Congregationalist non-conformist religious leanings, and a powerful utilitarian sociology. On 4 November 1839, the Musical World noted that Sara and her sister had both appeared at a lecture given at the Hoxton National School Room in inner North London by Charles Henry Purday (1799–1885) known for his theories on 'The Proper Object of Music'.[12]

Flower was believed to be connected with John Hullah's classes in London's Exeter Hall.[13] Flower was also believed to be associated with "Music for the Million", the singing school of Joseph Mainzer (1801–1851),[14] which had been modeled on the monitorial method of Guillaume Louis Bocquillon Wilhem [1781–1842] and his 'Orphéon' choral fests[15] for teaching often illiterate working people to sight-sing from notation sheets as a non-conformist socio-religious project to revitalize music education in the Anglican Church.[16]

Contrary to conjecture around deeper links to non-conformism and/or the Psalmody Movement, a post-1847 Flower family memorial plaque on the walls of the Grays parish church of St Peter and St Paul does not suggest any powerful non-conformist link, nor does her R.A.M. career under the dictatorial rule of its President, John Fane, Lord Burghersh (1784–1859).[17]

Voice

Various British and Australian newspaper reports of the period describe Flower's voice and vocal affect with terms such as volume; melody; compass; resonance; sonorousness; simplicity; cultivation; powerful; exquisite; flexible; rich; full; distinct; nervous; rare; delicious; sweet; mellow; liquid; welling; gushing; wonderful; expressive; clear; enchanting; perfect; delightful; wonderful; extraordinary; thrilling; electrifying; melancholy; noble; pure; magnificent; splendid; glorious; astonishing; commanding; great; masterly; force of expression; sensation; harmony; charm; liveliness; ease; heart-pathos; depth of feeling; emotional power; tenderness; a host in itself; divine; beyond praise; heaven; a treasure; the great contralto.

On 7 January 1843, Sara Flower made her anonymous London debut in a opera at Drury Lane as an all-but non-singing Felix (Pippo) to Sabilla Novello's Annette (the youngest daughter of music publisher Vincent Novello) in a hybrid Macready production of Rossini's opera La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie). The opera was characterized as 'little more than a melodrama with a few airs interspersed'.[18]

A review on Sara's recitative introduction in a duet role with Annette in 'Ebben per mia' reported her positive reception:

'her notes were so exceedingly full and rich, her articulation so admirable, rare qualities in an English singer of recitative, that the audience were literally taken by surprise, and uttered loud and continuous applause, which was frequently reiterated as the very superior quality of her voice was exhibited in the course of the duet'.[8]

The reviewer described her voice then as 'a mezzo-soprano of singular volume, with some excellent contralto notes, which she touches with firmness'. The unusual review went beyond the norm of describing the voice to also cover the reaction of an audience which cried out spontaneously over a few bars of recitative.[19]

Contemporary London comment associated Flower's voice with that of Marietta Brambilla (1807–1875) as possessing a 'contralto voice of [...] delicious voluptuous quality'.[20] Six years later in Australia, Flower's voice was described as being "like one of those boy-voices that one meets with once in one's life and remembers for ever after, so clear, so full, and nervous, and of such volume and compass".[21]

British professional career

Around 4 November 1839 she assisted C. H. Purday presenting a lecture "The Proper Object of Music" at the Hoxton National School Room, London, and on 29 October 1841 was admitted to the Royal Academy of Music, London as a student of singing. Her operatic debut was on 7 January 1843 at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, as the peasant Pippo, in Macready's concert version of Rossini's La gazza ladra, starring Sabilla Novello as Annette. She would reprise that role with full orchestra at the Princess's Theatre with Emma Albertazzi as Annette from 17 July the same year, having in that theatre from 17 April 1843 appeared in Rossini's Tancredi in the name role. She played Adina in Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore , from 11 October 1843 with Paul Bedford as Dulcamara, and Rebecca Isaacs as Floretta. She made a few appearances on the concert stage, the left for Italy to further her studies.

On her return to London she made a series of appearances at the Princess's Theatre: as Bertha Edward Loder's Night Dancers, with Emma Albertazzi as Giselle from 28 October 1846, and Ernestine in George Rodwell's Seven Maids of Munich from 19 December 1846. Donizetti's Anna Bolena as Smeaton followed on 12 January 1847, starring Louisa Bassano in the name part, Mendelssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream as Oberon from 23 April 1847, and as Donna Olympia in Loder's The Young Guard, starring Anna Thillon from 20 January 1848.

Flower took part in several concerts at the Surrey Zoological Gardens, Louis-Antoine Jullien's Concerts Monstre on 24 July 1848 and 28 September 1848.

Around this time she was a member of the corps musicale attending the ninth reunion of the General Theatrical Fund held at the London Tavern, Bishopsgate Street, chaired by Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton and supported by Charles Dickens.[22]

She emigrated to Australia on the migrant ship Clifton, which left London on 14 November 1849.

Australia

Clifton, of 867 tons, E. W. Beasley, commander, from London the largest of three emigrant ships chartered by John Dunmore Lang, arrived in Port Phillip with some 200 emigrants, mostly from Evangelical Churches. Lang was one of the 20-odd named cabin passengers, and it must be assumed Flower travelled in steerage.[23] Her first Australian performance was in Melbourne, at the Mechanics' Institute on 28 February 1850, for Reed. This was advertised as her only Melbourne appearance, as she was to continue to Sydney aboard Clifton, but was persuaded to appear again for Reed at the Queen's Theatre on 26 March[24] and proceed to Sydney aboard Asia. She was to join her brother,[25] believed to be George Flower (died 16 July 1890), manager of the Commercial Bank in Muswellbrook c. 1867–1890.[26] but whose earlier occupation has not been found. She arrived on 15 April 1850 and made her first Sydney appearance at the Victoria Theatre on 3 May 1850 for S. and H. Marsh.[27]

Sara Flower married Samuel Howard Taylor of Sydney on 20 December 1851. He turned to the stage in 1855 as Sam Howard, low comedian.[28]

She was the first Norma in Australia. Two characters in which she made a great impression were Azucena in Il trovatore and Maffio Orsini in Lucrezia Borgia.[29]

She suffered from rheumatism, and in her last years was unable even to take students. She died, destitute but proud, at her residence, 137 Victoria Street, Woolloomooloo on 20 August 1865[30] and her body was interred at the old Devonshire Street Cemetery on the following day; a single coach carried her mourners. Her remains were later transferred to the new cemetery at La Perouse, where a monument was placed on her grave be a group of enthusiasts.[31]

Notes and references

• Beedell, A.V. 2000, 'Terminal Silence: Sara Flower and the Diva Enigma: Explorations of Voice and the Maternal in Operatic Experience in Colonial Australian History ca. 1850-1865' in 2 volumes. PhD Faculty of Arts, Griffith University, Queensland.
• Diehl, Alice [1897] Musical Memories, (London)
• Diehl, Alice [1905] The True Story of My Life. An Autobiography, (London)
• Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians 1961, 5th ed. edited by Eric Blom (London, Macmillan)
• Gyger, Alison, "Flower, Sara Elizabeth", Australian Dictionary of Biography, Online Edition (accessed 18 January 2010)
• Musical World (London 1836-91)
• Poizat, Michel 1992, The Angel's Cry. Beyond the Pleasure Principle in Opera, trans. Arthur Denner (Ithaca and London)
• Rainbow, Bernarr 1970, The Choral Revival in the Anglican Church (1839–1872). (London, Barrie & Jenkins)
• Stendhal (Henri Beyle) 1956 [1824] Life of Rossini trans. Richard N. Coe, London
• Times, The (London)

External references

• 'Cowgill, Rachel and Peter Holman 2007, Music in the British Provinces 1690-1914 (Ashgate)'
• 'Thurrock Heritage - Factfiles [Alice Diehl]' www.thurrock.gov.uk/heritage
• https://monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/people/arts/display/21784-sara-flower

На других языках

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- [en] Sara Flower

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[ru] Флауэр, Сара

Сара Элизабет Флауэр (англ. Sara Elizabeth Flower; 1823, Грейс, Англия — 20 августа 1865, Сидней, Австралия) — австралийская оперная певица (контральто) английского происхождения.

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