Kathleen Ferrier - Biografie

Kathleen Ferrier - Biografie
Last Updated Monday, 12 March 2012 21:12
Arrival at the airport Schiphol, January 1951
Kathleen Ferrier was born in Higher Walton (Lancashire) on April 22, 1912 into a family of
modest means. Here parents were music-lovers, and at the age of three Kathleen began to play
the piano. She passed her youth in Blackburn and her original intention was to become a
pianist. Financial circumstances at home prevented this and she became a telephone operator
at the age of fourteen. She did not abandon the piano altogether and started to sing
occasionally for her own amusement. She married in 1935 and took part in the Carlisle Festival
Contest in 1937 not only as a pianist but also as a singer in response to her husband's
challenge. She won the first prize in both categories and this was all the encouragement she
needed to continue her musical studies. In 1939 she started studying singing, first with Dr.
Hutchinson in Blackburn. He worked with her over a period of over three years, until Christmas
1942. After a period during the war of travelling England to appear in the most isolated of
places, often under very difficult conditions she settled in London, 1942. There she continued
her vocal training with Roy Henderson, or 'Prof' as she used to call him affectionately. Around
1944 she had established herself as an oratorio singer and was heard by Benjamin Britten
when she sang in Messiah in Westminster Abbey. At that time Britten was working on a new
opera for Glyndebourne after having gained international successes with his Peter Grimes in
1945 and it was in fact Peter Pears who proposed Kathleen Ferrier for the title part in The Rape
of Lucretia (alternating with Nancy Evans), 1946. This became the start of her international
career; due to the tour on the continent Holland was the first country where Kathleen Ferrier
was heard outside England. She immediately became a great favourite with the Dutch public
and returned to Holland very soon for recitals.
Portret by Cecil Beaton, 1951
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Kathleen Ferrier - Biografie
Last Updated Monday, 12 March 2012 21:12
In 1947 Glyndebourne heard her for the first time as Orfeo in Clucks Orfeo ed Euridice and
again Holland should still be grateful to Peter Diamand for he organised a series of
performances of this opera during the 1949 Holland Festival with Kathleen Ferrier and
conducted by Pierre Monteux. Thus Holland became the only country outside England where
Kathleen Ferrier has been heard and admired in both her operatic creations.
Of all the composers with whom Kathleen Ferrier was associated, one stands out: Gustav
Mahler. Despite her illuminating performances of 'Das Lied von der Erde', and the three
'Rückert Lieder', it was with the 'Kindertotenlieder' that she felt an especial affinity.
Performances with widely differing conductors punctuated her career: Fritz Reiner, Erich
Kleiber, Jonn Barbirolli, Clemens Kraus, and the two great disciples of Mahler, Bruno Walter
and Otto Klemperer. At the piano she was accompanied by a.o. Phyllis Spurr, John Newmark
and Gerald Moore. Especially Barbirolli and his wife became close friends just as John
Newmark and Gerald Moore.
....... Since Ferrier's untimely death, it is peculiarly moving to hear Ferrier sing 'Ich bin der Welt
abhanden gekommen', although she is lost to the world, she is still part of it. As long as this
performance remains available, that will be so.
Alan Blyth
Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen, mit dir ich sonst viele Zeit verdorben, sie hat solange
nichts von mir vernommen,
sie mag wohl glauben, ich sei gestorben!
Es ist mir auch gar nichts daran gelegen,
ob sie mich für gestorben hält.
Ich kann auch gar nichts sagen dagegen,
denn wirklich ich bin gestorben der Welt.
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Kathleen Ferrier - Biografie
Last Updated Monday, 12 March 2012 21:12
Ich bin gestorben dem Weltgetümmel
und ruh in einem stillen Gebiet!
Ich leb allein in meinem Himmel,
in meinem Lieben, in meinem Lied.
Poem by Friedrich Rückert
In 1951 the first symptoms manifested themselves of the illness that in the end would be fatal
for her, but at first it seemed that an operation had put a stop to this. New symptoms occurred in
1952 but they did not prevent her from accepting an invitation by Sir John Barbirolli to sing
Orfeo in Covent Garden. She sang a beautiful first night on February 3, 1953, but during the
second performance on February 6 she was in terrible pains and only her enormous will-power
enabled her to finish the performance in such a way that nobody in the audience had any notion
of this. She was taken straight into hospital from the theatre where two operations in succession
seemed to improve her condition. But on the morning of October 8, 1953 she passed away
calmly and peacefully; thus came an end to the life of one of the greatest and most endearing
singers of the century. A singer who, after an international career that lasted in fact no more
than six years altogether, has obtained an everlasting place in the hearts of those who heard
her in the flesh or came to know her through her records.
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Complete list of her repertoire
Discography
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