She is a soprano born Mary
Violet Leontyne Price in Laurel, Mississippi.Her father was a lumber mill worker
and her mother a housewife.When
her parents noticed her musical talents they used their phonograph as a
trade-in for a down payment on an upright piano and she began lessons.Her mother worked as a maid at the
house of an upper class family and they would often ask her to sing for
them at their family events. She studied at the CentralStateUniversity,
Wilberforce, Ohio
and her glee club appearances led to solo performances which helped her to
complete her voice studies. With
the help of Paul Robeson and the family her
mother worked for she was able to study at the JuilliardSchool. Her debut as a stage performer was in
Verdi's Falstaff which was attended
by the composer Virgil Thomson and he immediately hired her to perform in
his opera Four Saints in Three Acts.Her big break was playing Bess in Porgy and Bess and she toured in the
production throughout America
and then Europe.She married the singer William Warfield, who had played Porgy to her Bess, in the
early 1950s, but they separated in 1958 and divorced in 1972 with William
stating in his memoirs that "their careers soon forced them apart".She became a specialist in modern
music by composers such as Igor Stravinsky and Samuel Barber, whom she sang
with as he played the piano in his premiere of Hermit Songs.The
two of them were both together again for her New York
recital debut.She returned to
opera when The Met invited her to sing "Summertime" at a
fundraiser and it is thought that she was the first African-American to "sing
for the Met and with the Met, even if not with the company in the house".There was controversy over her
casting in Tosca for the NBC-TV
Opera in 1955 which caused many of the affiliates not to broadcast the
production. After auditioning
for Herbert von Karajan at Carnegie Hall it is said that he pushed the
pianist to one side, accompanied her himself and immediately asked her to
sing for him at the Vienna State Opera after she had refused him for La
Scala.The next 10 years saw
the two of them performing together in many productions.She has since sung in the major operatic
venues worldwide, often in her acclaimed role in Aida. After a
performance at the Met she and her leading man, Franco Corelli, received a 42
minute ovation.She is seen as being
instrumental in the acceptance of African-Americans in opera and continued
to give performances even after her retirement.She has been awarded the
Presidential Medal of Freedom, the National Medal of Arts, the Kennedy
Center Honors, a Lifetime Achievement Grammy and 19 Grammy Awards.
