Maria

Maria Gay

Maria Pichot Gironés

Barcelona , 13 de juny de 1879
New York , 29 de juliol de 1943

Performer

Mezzosoprano

She studied music in her family circle and with herfirst husband Joan Gay at Orfeó Català. She sang lieder in the concerts of the Institució Catalana de Música and collaborated with the Societat Coral Catalunya Nova. In 1902 she moved to Brussels, where she performed with Ysaÿe, and then to Paris, where he studied with Ada Adini. In 1906 she debuted at the Théâtre de la Monnaie with the opera Carmen, a role that would be her specialty. Until the end of the 1920s, she sang in theaters around Europe and America, such as Opera Comique (Paris), Covent Garden (London), Teatro alla Scala (Milan), Metropolitan (New York), Teatro Real (Madrid), Teatro Colón (Buenos Aires) and Metropolitan (Chicago) and with the Boston Opera Company. Together with her second husband the tenor Zenatello, they started the Arena of Verona in 1913. In addition, she recorded for Columbia Phonograph Company. In 1927 she left the stage and in 1930 she founded and directed a singing school in New York.