# A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Tietjens, Therese

​TIETJENS or TITIENS, Therese Caroline Johanna, the great prima donna, was born at Hamburg, of Hungarian parents, according to some biographers in 1834, to others, in 1831. The latter date agrees best with subsequent facts, and also with the inscription on her tombstone, which states that she died in 1877, aged 46.
Her voice, even in childhood, gave so much promise of future excellence that she was educated for the lyric stage. She appeared for the first time at the Hamburg Opera, in 1849, as Lucrezia Borgia, and achieved an immediate success. She proceeded to Frankfort, and thence, in 1856, to Vienna, where, though not engaged as the leading prima donna, her performance of Valentine raised her at once to the highest rank.
The late Madame Jullien heard her at this time, and it was largely due to her glowing accounts that Mdlle. Tietjens was quickly engaged by Mr. Lumley for his last season at Her Majesty's Theatre in London; and when, on April 13, 1858, she appeared in 'The Huguenots,' her impersonation of Valentine achieved a success which increased with every repetition of the opera, and was the first link in that close union between the performer and the public which was only to be severed by death.
England from that time became her home. She remained at Her Majesty's Theatre during the successive managements of Mr. E. T. Smith and Mr. Mapleson, and after the burning of the theatre in 1867 followed the fortunes of the company to Drury Lane. She sang at Covent Garden during the two years' coalition of the rival houses in 69 and 70, returning to Drury Lane in 71, and finally, just before her death, to the new house in the Haymarket.
Her performances are still fresh in the memory of all opera and concert goers. Never was so mighty a soprano voice so sweet and luscious in its tone: like a serene, full, light, without dazzle or glare, it filled the largest arena without appearing to penetrate. It had none of a soprano's shrillness or of that peculiar clearness called 'silvery'; when it declined, as it eventually did, in power, it never became wiry. It had a mezzo-soprano quality extending to the highest register, perfectly even throughout, and softer than velvet. Her acting in no way detracted from her singing; she was earnest, animated, forcible, in all she did conscientious and hearty, but not electric. Her style of singing was noble and pure. When she first came to England her rapid execution left much to be desired; it was heavy and imperfect. Fluency and flexibility were not hers by nature, but by dint of hard work she overcame all difficulties, so as to sing with success in the florid music of Rossini and Bellini. Indeed she attempted almost everything, and is perhaps the only singer, not even excepting Malibran, who has sung in such completely opposite rôles as those of Semiramide and Fides. But her performance of light or comic parts was a mere tour de force; her true field was grand opera. As Lucrezia, Semiramide, Countess Almaviva, she was great; as Donna Anna and Valentine she was greater; best of all as Fidelio, and as Medea in Cherubim's opera, revived for her and not likely to be forgotten by any who heard it.
In the 'Freischütz,' as in 'Fidelio,' her appearance was unsuited to her part, but she sang the music as no one else could sing it. In her later years she set a good example by undertaking the rôle of Ortrud in 'Lohengrin.' The music however did not show her voice to advantage, and this was still more the case with the music of Fides, although her acting in both parts was very fine. Her repertoire also included Leonora ('Trovatore'), the Favorita, Alice, Lucia, Amalia ('Un Ballo in Maschera'), Norma, Pamina, Margherita, Marta, Elvira ('Ernani') Reiza ('Oberon'), and Iphigenia in Tauris.
Her voice was as well suited to sacred as to dramatic music, and she applied herself assiduously to the study of oratorio, for which her services were in perpetual request. Perhaps the hardest worked singer who ever appeared, she was also the most faithful and conscientious of artists, never disappointing her public, who knew that her name on the bills was a guarantee against change of programme, or apology for absence through indisposition. No doubt her splendid physique enabled her often to sing with impunity when others could not have done so, but her ceaseless efforts must have tended to break up her constitution at last. This great conscientiousness, as well as her genial sympathetic nature, endeared her to the whole nation, and, though there never was a 'Tietjens fever,' her popularity steadily increased and never waned. Her kindness and generosity to young and struggling artists and to her distressed countrymen knew no bounds and became proverbial.
[ F. A. M. ]