Nina Koshetz (1891 - 1965)

Complete Victor and Schirmer recordings 1928/9 and 1940

Note by Alan Bilgora











To devotees of recorded vocal art, the voice of Nina Koshetz epitomises that special quality associated with the finest Russian lyric sopranos; a warm and unaffected lower register, (almost mezzo-soprano in colour) suffused with the romantic timbre inherent in the Russian language, and coupled with a delivery tinged with a melancholy that in Koshetz case was no doubt due in part to her Jewish heritage. The highest tones possess a well-controlled unforced brilliance that is not only dramatically effective and affecting, but always impressive, whether singing fortissimo or pianissimo. From the outset of her operatic career she received only the highest praise. Eventually her very distinctive vocal traits were recognised by the entire musical establishment, particularly in the U.S. Her recordings, particularly the American Victors used for this CD set, remain sought after items by collectors throughout the world.

Nina Pavlovna Koshits (she employed the westernised spelling ‘Koshetz’ only later in America) was probably born in Kiev on 18th December 1891 (although some sources give 1894, which fits less easily with the known dates of her entry to the Conservatory, her marriage and operatic debut) into a family of musicians. Her mother, Tamara, was a soprano who sang with the Imperial Opera in Moscow and her father, Pavel Alexeevitch Poray-Koshits, was the scion of a Lithuanian and Polish family. He enjoyed a fine national and indeed international career as a tenor appearing in Russia, Greece, Italy and South America following his period of study at the Moscow Conservatory of Music. Pavel Alexeevitch was the first tenor to sing Siegfried in Russia and reportedly an excellent musician who sang many new works. But he probably undertook too many dramatic roles, and his voice rather quickly lost its beauty. Aged only forty he was confined to supporting roles and to teaching, and the severe depression brought on by this change of fortune led to his suicide.

Despite her father’s tragic death, Nina decided to pursue a musical career and entered the Moscow Conservatory in 1905 to study the piano. She was in the class of Konjstantin Ugumnov and later Vassily Safonov (who’s pupils included Alexander Scriabin, Nikolai Medtner, Josef and Rosina Lhevinne) both outstanding musicians who believed Nina capable of becoming a distinguished concert pianist. Sergei Taneyev, a pupil of Tchaikovsky and teacher of Sergei Rakhmaninov, was her tutor in composition. He encouraged her to set poems by Bunin, Nadson and Lamon, the consequent song cycles becoming a feature of her later recital programmes. This talent for composition and her high degree of general musicianship assured Nina of an affinity with the composers of note who she met and championed throughout her career.

At the Conservatory Nina studied voice as a second subject, that is until her teacher Umberto Masetti convinced her that singing was her true path. She went on to study privately with the renowned soprano Felia Litvinne (1860-1936) and (as she initially favoured an operatic career) also worked with Konstantin Stanislavsky then director of the Moscow Arts Theatre, and a seminal influence on modern theatre. She became his star pupil and evidently the only female opera singer he ever taught. The critics at the time thought her opera performances unequalled for their realism. While still a student she deputised for an indisposed soprano in the final act of Tristan und Isolde and won an ovation from the audience that resolved her to prepare for an operatic career.

In 1911 Nina married the artist Alexander Schubert. In 1913 she signed a contract with the Zimin Opera Company, which (because it had no ballet programme) gave more opera performances each season than the Imperial Opera - the post-revolutionary Bolshoi. Nina was immediately assigned principal roles, making her debut on 13th September 1913 as Tatiana in Evgeny Onegin, followed the next evening by Donna Anna in Don Giovanni. In her first season she appeared as Tamara in Rubenstein’s The Demon, Desdemona in Otello, Lisa in Pique Dame, Natasha in The Enchantress and Olga in the Moscow première of Glukovtsev’s Days of our Lives after which performance one Moscow critic wrote: "Her delivery was moved by simplicity, sincerity and spontaneity. She was not theatrical, instead her singing was a living creativity, a voice of the soul." And although still of limited experience Nina was offered recording contracts by the Beka and Aristotipia labels ... titles which are now, in their 78 rpm original form, extremely rare.

In the summer of 1914 Nina made the first of her extensive concert tours of the provinces before returning to the Zimin Opera for a second season. She added the roles of Ruth in Verstovsky’s Askold’s Tomb, Germaine in Planquette’s Cloches de Corneveille and Maria Ivanova in The Captain’s Daughter by Cui. She also participated in the Moscow première of a folk opera based on traditional melodies arranged by Bookke called The Miller as Wizard, Deceiver and Marriage-Broker. Like her father before her she eagerly sought out new roles and in the 1915 season created Natasha in Kudeyar by Olenin and the heroine in Kankarovich’s Son of the Earth. And from the standard repertoire she added Rachel in Halevy’s La Juive, Nedda in Pagliacci and Hermione in Goldmark’s Wintermärchen. She sang Marina in Boris Godunov for the first time, alongside the great bass Feodor Chaliapin (1873-1938) who was appearing as a guest with the company.

Later that year, at a party, she met Rakhmaninov who offered to accompany her in a series of recitals. Nina eagerly agreed, even though she already had a successful touring schedule partnered at the piano by the likes of Ippolitov-Ivanov, Kankarovich, Plotnikov, Cooper and Prokofiev, and in orchestral concerts by Siloti and Koussevitsky. Her recitals with Rakhmaninov are legendary simply because she was the only singer he ever accompanied in public. For her he wrote the Op.38 cycle - love songs to texts by modern Russian poets, and their relationship seemed to develop into a highly personal one. In the 1916-17 season, again at the Zimin Opera, she sang some of her favourite roles, and created the title-role in Kastalsky’s Klara Milich. It was noticed that she was beginning to put on weight, something that with her love of good food and wine would become a constant problem in later life. Nina’s only child was born, a daughter called Marina. And of her relationship with Rakhmaninov, (who also was married with a family), which had caused a furore in certain circles: after presenting the première of the song cycle Op.39 in October 1916, and following some differences of artistic opinion they went their own way. He always admired her art, and occasionally corresponded, but though both lived in America for many years they never met again.

The political unrest and the Bolshevik uprisings in 1917 did not initially affect Nina’s musical life but in 1917 the Zimin Opera lost all their stage sets and costumes in a huge fire and the Company was forced to disband. Nina made her debut at the St. Petersburg Maryinski Theatre that year singing Tatiana. In 1918 she presented a series of concerts featuring the development of Russian song, in which she was accompanied by professors from the Moscow Conservatory, each of whom had a specific association with the individual composers.

Eventually the Revolution impacted the professional classes, as it had the aristocrats, and to escape the suffering, particularly in Moscow, Nina fled with her family to the Caucasus. There she sang in concert, taught singing and performed a few of her wellknown operatic roles. After securing the assistance of high-placed officials and much negotiation, Nina manage to secure visas for herself and family and (like so many of her compatriots who were to seek asylum), in 1920 emigrated to the United States. There, unheralded, she began to sing at private musical soirèes, and, with the support of other musical émigrés, slowly built a new reputation. Important among her supporters at this time were the composer Prokofiev and Ossip Gabrilowitsch (brilliant pianist and conductor of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra 1918-1936) with whom Nina made her official American debut in two concerts on December 31st and January 1st, singing the Letter scene from Evgeny Onegin, Rakhmaninov’s Vocalise and an aria from Rimsky- Korsakov’s The Tzar’s Bride. The Detroit Journal’s critic reported: "Her voice is an utterance of beauty and authority. Her success was enormous."

Two weeks later Nina sang in New York at the Scholar Cantorum. That demanding critic Richard Aldrich wrote in the Times, but, although praising her dramatic qualities and choice of programme especially her singing of Russian songs, he was not overly enthusiastic. Not so Nicolai Sokolov who immediately engaged her to sing four concerts with the Cleveland Orchestra. Concerts with the Boston and St. Paul Symphony orchestras followed, and then a recital accompanied by Prokofiev in which she sang the cycle of vocalises (Op.35) the composer had written especially for her. On 27th March 1921 at the New York Town Hall she performed for a large and enthusiastic audience after which Aldrich commented: "She sang best and naturally the Russian songs with the spirit native to them. In these she was often deeply moving and interesting."

Nina made her first visit to the Victor Studios in April 1921, to make some test recordings, but was not offered a contract. She continued to give recitals and performed in concerts with distinguished conductors such as Stokowski, Koussevitsky, Klemperer and Rodzinski. The soprano Mary Garden (1874-1967) then the newly appointed director of the Chicago Opera Company selected her to take part in the world première of Prokofiev’s Love of three Oranges on 30th December, conducted by the composer. She appeared as Fata Morgana in a cast containing the colourful Mexican tenor Jose Mojica (who abandoned a successful operatic and film career to become a Franciscan friar), the eminent Belgian baritone Hector Dufranne and the French bass Edouard Cotreuil in the other major roles. The opera was given again in New York during the Chicago Company’s annual tour but did not receive critical approval. Among her recitals for 1922 was one with the baritone Dubinsky and the pianist Nicolas Stember given at a White House Musicale for President and Mrs. Harding.

Whilst in New York she was contacted by Leon Feodoroff, on behalf of the Russian Grand Opera Company, and asked to substitute for Ina Bourskaya whose contract with the Metropolitan precluded her from singing for any other local organization. Nina eventually appeared as Lisa in Pique Dame, Tamara in The Demon and Lyubasha in The Tsar’s Bride. Max Smith in an edition of the New York American magazine enthused about her singing with the Company and wrote: " ... by dint of singing and acting that throbs with emotional vitality and temperament, Nina Koshetz, a vibrant buoyant personality, dominates the opera stage". In 1922 Nina visited the recording studio of the Brunswick Company, making eleven discs of which 10 were issued. They feature her in opera and song and are much admired by collectors. On her return from recitals in Italy and England she curtailed her planned touring in order to appear with the Ukrainian National Chorus, conducted by her cousin Alexander Koshetz. Together with Oda Slobodskaya they were the featured soloists with the Chorus. Following the U.S. tour they went with the group to Mexico City (performing to an audience of 32,000 in the bullring), and then to Cuba and several other South American countries. She gave a recital in New York Town Hall devoted to songs by Rakhmaninov, but the composer, who was invited, arrived too late and they did not meet. In 1923 she again went on tour with the Ukrainian National Chorus to South America beginning the series at the Colon Opera House, Buenos Aires on 28th May. Later that year back in the U.S. she sang with the Detroit Symphony at a ‘Pops’ concert which won the following comments from the local critic McLaughlin: " ... for a soloist we had the tried and true Nina Koshetz, who produced the beauties of her warm soprano more agreeably than ever before. She is assuredly one of the most satisfactory of singers and, in her own field, can give cards in spades to most of her colleagues."

Hoping to return to the operatic stage Nina then signed a contract to appear with the Colon Opera, where a number of the singers appearing had huge European reputations but were unknown in Buenos Aires. Nina however was welcomed as a well-remembered and respected soloist and she gave her operatic debut as Marina in Boris Godunov with the talented bass-baritone Sigismund Zalesky in the title role. She sang Lisa in Pique Dame and one performance of Tosca with the sensational Spanish tenor Miguel Fleta as Cavaradossi. She also gave several performances as Yaroslavna in Prince Igor again with Zalesky. The company then visited Montevideo and Rio di Janeiro where Nina sang, for the first time, Margherita in Boito’s Mefistofele with the handsome tenor Angelo Minghetti as Faust and Tancredo Pasero, one of Italy’s most distinguished basses as Mefistofele.

Following her success in South America she sailed for France and in Paris took some further tuition from Felia Litvinne, who subsequently arranged for Nina’s debut in the French capital at the Salle Gaveau. On the 28th January 1925 she made her Paris Opéra debut with a visiting Russian troupe, as Marina with Zaleski as Boris. She also sang in the interlude of a one-act ballet Taglioni chez Musette set to music by Auber, Meyerbeer and Boieldieu. In that season she mysteriously consented to be featured in a series of performances at the Music Hall des Champs Elysée, where appearing on the same bill among the acrobats and clowns was the coloratura soprano Elvira de Hidalgo - the teacher of Maria Callas. On the 4th April 1926 she sang with the Paris Conservatory Orchestra under Phillipe Gaubert receiving rave reviews. The Excelsior critic Emile Vuillermoz wrote: "The public was frantic ... a brilliant facile and easy voice, supple, rich and purely emitted. Every sound every note has a colour of freshness that is very stirring. A voice unique with no imperfection".

On December 26th, in a rare honour for a female performer, Nina was invited to give a recital at the Academia di Santa Cecilia in Rome together with the composer Alexander Grechaninov, with whom she also appeared at an orchestral concert singing arias from his opera Dobrinya Nikitich. Further tours of the Baltics followed and then a return to Paris and the Theatre de Champs Eleysee as Yaroslavna and some recitals of Russian songs. Her daughter Marina was studying the piano in Paris so Nina settled there for while, but in 1928 she returned to the United States and finally (following some more tests!) was awarded a contract with the Victor Company, producing these discs which have been much admired by all lovers of singing ever since.

In 1928 Nina made her first broadcast on the Atwater-Kent programme and then travelled again to France. She returned to the U.S. on the SS Paris - giving a joint recital on board with the composer Maurice Ravel. The next two years were dedicated to recitals and concerts (including a Carnegie Hall appearance with Nicolai Medtner singing the Serenade which the composer had dedicated to her), and radio broadcasts. In one series of concerts she even included the futuristic music of Leon Theramin who performed on his etherwave instrument. Her promoting of modern composers gave her the opportunity of presenting not only Russian songs by established composers like Borodin, Glinka, Tchaikovsky, Dargomyzhky and Rimsky-Korsakov, but also new voices like Stravinsky, Rakhmaninov and Skriabin among others.

By 1934 she began to reduce her performances, although she did make more recordings for Victor. In 1935 Jose Iturbi engaged her for a Hollywood Bowl concert and she took up residence in southern California soon after that. She helped her daughter with her vocal studies, as following her mother’s example, Marina had also decided she wanted to be a singer. Marina actually deputised for her mother on several occasions on the Kraft Music Hall radio programme hosted by Bing Crosby. Also in 1935 Nina was signed by Paramount Pictures to appear in Enter Madame and between then and 1956 she made cameo appearances in eight films either singing or acting in the company of the most famous film stars of the era. Two Feature films Old Russian Jamboree in 1948 and The Koshetz Story in 1956 feature the singing of both mother and daughter.

In 1939 Nina and her second husband Gabriel Leonoff, a former tenor, opened a Russian restaurant, where she was known to sing for the diners. Unfortunately after some initial success the venture failed forcing the couple into bankruptcy. Nina made one last public appearance at the San Francisco Community Playhouse singing the nurse Filippievna in a production of Evgeny Onegin in which her daughter was singing Tatiana. By this time her natural inclination of bonne viveuse, (not helped by the restaurant venture), had caused her to gain an enormous amount of weight. Thereafter, when she appeared in public, she always wore a large shawl to hide her huge figure.

Although her career was over, she did in 1939/40 make another batch of recordings for the Schirmer Publishing House, dedicated to the songs of Rakhmaninov and although not in her best voice and subjected to a rather poor recording ambience, they nonetheless still illustrate her artistry. In 1942 Nina and Gabriel moved to Laguna Beach and opened a singing school that soon attracted a large number of students, including a number of film stars who needed coaching for speciality numbers in their movies; Marlene Dietrich, Carole Lombard, and Claudette Colbert were keen pupils. In 1949 Marina made her New York Town Hall debut with Nina at the piano, and after the recital her mother made the famous comment, "from now on she is on her own".

Nina was the subject of a feature article in Life magazine, surviving the unflattering photographs that accentuated her enormous size but did nothing to dampen her love of life. She continued to devote herself to teaching and judging vocal competitions, and to supporting Young Musical America from which grew the Young Musicians Foundation, with which she was associated for the rest of her life.

In her last few years, her lifestyle revolved around parties. Food and drink flowed, and in the company of a wide circle of friends, both social and musical, she never tired of recounting the stories of her eventful international career. Her excesses finally caught up with her heart and she was admitted to the Orange county General Hospital on 22nd April 1965 where her condition deteriorated and she died on the 14th May. Nina Koshetz’s body was cremated on the 18th May and her ashes interred at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California.

Her death was widely reported in all the media, the obituaries called attention to her importance in the world of music and in particular her promotion and interpretation of classical Russian song. As Samuel Chotzinoff said "her voice vibrates in all its registers like a Stradivarius in the hands of a sensitive violinist".

All the recordings used for this CD compilation show Koshetz at her interpretive best. Particular attention is drawn however to her emotional and passionate singing of Yaroslavna’s aria from Prince Igor, the religious aura she creates with her singing of Ravel’s Kaddish and in particular the traditional Yiddish lament Eili Eili. There is infinite tenderness in her singing of the lullaby from Sadko, and hearing her version of Estrellita by Ponce, (reportedly dedicated to her), we are forever entranced by a leisurely tempo and those radiant, poised, perfectly controlled high notes.

Bibliography:
Opera in Chicago. Ronald L.Davis. Appleton-Century, New York, 1966
Mille Voci una Stella. Luciano di Cave. Corrucci Editore, Roma, 1985
Groses Sängerlexicon. Kutch/Riemans. Francke Verlag, Bern, 1987
Nina Koshetz. E,H Pearson. Record Collector, Chelmsford, 1994
Opera on Film. K. Wlaschin. Yale University Press, New Haven, 2004


The total number of Koshetz electrical recordings exceeds the length of one CD but are not quite enough to fill a second disc. We have therefore taken the opportunity to present recordings made by a contemporary artist who remained in Russia and is little known outside her homeland - Odarka Trifonieva Sprishevskaya (1885-1969). She embodies many of those excellent qualities so admired in Koshetz.

We do not know what took the travelling engineers of the Victor Company to Harbin, Manchuria in 1928. However, while there they made a series of recordings of the Soviet artists performing in the city at that time. These were Sergei Lemeshev, (later one of Russia’s most well known tenors), the baritone Knizhnikov, the bass Shushlin, the sopranos Ina Bourskaya, (who jumped ship and later became a member of the New York Metropolitan), S.A. Baturina who sang the dramatic roles, and Sprishevskaya the lyric ones.

From 1913 Sprishevskaya (born in the Ukraine in 1895) was a pupil of L. Donskai in Moscow, where she appeared in opera until 1921. She moved to Tiflis, then Harbin and finally Sverdlovsk remaining there until 1937. She became a soloist with the All-Union Concert Management Association in 1938 and appeared with that organization until 1948, during which time she sang all the major lyric roles in the Russian repertory. She was also much admired as Elsa in Lohengrin, Marguerite in Faust, Nedda in Pagliacci, Gilda in Rigoletto and the title role in Madama Butterfly. On her retirement from the theatre she became a vocal teacher, and died in Moscow in 1969.

Of the ten sides Sprishevskaya recorded we have transferred eight. Each demonstrates a beautiful bright shimmering tone that is well controlled throughout the complete range, and a vocal line delivered with a languid quality that allows the melody take hold of the listener. Sprishevskaya’s voice shares much of that romantic timbre also heard in Nina Koshetz, or in the lovely Natasha Vechor who settled in France, and in Maria Kurenko, another well-known Russian soprano who ended her career in the United States.

A number of these arias and choruses are slightly truncated – probably to fit the limited playing time of the 10-inch disc to which the engineers ‘portable’ recording equipment was limited. This in no way disturbs the superb artistry displayed by Sprishevskaya whose vocal excellence deserves to be far better known. Happily her art is now preserved here for all lovers of fine singing.

© 2006, Alan Bilgora

Bibliography:
Victrola Book of the Opera. Victor Talking Machine Co. Camden, USA, 1929
Victor’s Red-label Russians. Houston Maples. Record Collector, Chelmsford
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