page_title: Sara Cahier
section_title: Career
hierarchical_section_title: Sara Cahier / Career
caption_attribution_description: English: Madame Charles Cahier Identifier: grandoperasinger02lahe (find matches) Title: The grand opera singers of to-day&#160;: an account of the leading operatic stars who have sung during recent years, together with a sketch of the chief operatic enterprises Year: 1912 (1910s) Authors: Lahee, Henry Charles, 1856-1953 Subjects: Singers Opera Publisher: Boston&#160;: L. C. Page Contributing Library: Harold B. Lee Library Digitizing Sponsor: Brigham Young University View Book Page: Book Viewer About This Book: Catalog Entry View All Images: All Images From Book Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book. Text Appearing Before Image: se greatsingers were exchanged more or less. For in-stance, Miss Garden was a member of thePhiladelphia-Chicago Company, which tookover many of Hammerstein s singers, and sheappeared in Boston and in New York. MissFremstadt (who won new laurels during thatseason by her impersonation of Isolde) was amember of the Metropolitan Company, but ap-peared in all four houses. Baklanofr* and Con-stantineau of the Boston Company were ex-changed in a similar manner, and there wasfrequent new interest in the repetitions ofoperas by the presentation of new principals.This plan works very well at the present stageof the operatic enterprise of this country. Madame Charles Cahier was formerly SarahLayton Walker, of Indianapolis. She beganher career in America as a church and oratoriosinger, and then went to Paris to complete herstudies with Jean de Reszke. She made a mostsuccessful debut at Nice as Orpheus, in 1904,in consequence of which she had several flat-tering offers from various European opera- Text Appearing After Image: MADAME CHARLES CAHIER The Metropolitan Opera-House 329 houses. On the advice of de Reszke she refusedall of them and went to Germany to perfectherself in the Wagner repertory. When shemade her German debut it was as Amneris in Aida at Brunswick, and after filling vari-ous short engagements in Berlin and othercities she finally accepted an offer from GustavMahler to go to the Vienna opera. Madame Cahier was also selected by Mahlerto be soloist in several of the musical festivalswhich he conducted, and in this capacity sangat Munich, Vienna, Gratz, Mannheim, and othercontinental cities. She has appeared too atfestivals in London and Paris. In New York she made only two appearancesin opera, at the end of the season (1911-1912),as Azucena in II Trovatore, and as Amnerisin Aida, and she sang at one of the Metro-politan Sunday evening concerts. She showedherself to be a singer of admirable qualities,whose vocal resources are of the best, andwhose style is finished and broad. Her actingwas v Note About Images Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original work.
context_page_description: Sara Cahier was an American-born mezzo-soprano or contralto singer in opera and lieder, singing primarily in Europe. Cahier later acquired Swedish citizenship. She was associated with Gustav Mahler, and was one the soloists in the posthumous premiere of his Das Lied von der Erde in 1911. She sang at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, and was a teacher at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Her students included Marian Anderson.
context_section_description: She was born as Sara Jane Layton Walker in Nashville, Tennessee. She studied in Indianapolis and in Paris under Jean de Reszke, and in 1904 she made her debut as the character Orpheus in Orpheus and Eurydice in Nice. Other teachers of hers included Gustav Walter, Victor Capoul and Amalie Joachim.
  Her first husband was Morris Black. She married a Swede, the impresario Charles Cahier, in 1905. After this, she was generally billed as "Madame Charles Cahier", or "Sara Charles-Cahier".
  She was active in Vienna, joining the Hofoper in 1907, and Munich, often singing under Gustav Mahler's directorship in roles such as Amneris, Carmen, Delilah, Fidès, Ortrud, and Santuzza.
  Cahier and fellow American William Miller, a tenor, were chosen by Bruno Walter to premiere Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde in Munich posthumously in November 1911. She also sang in the New York premiere of the work in 1922, with tenor Orville Harrold, under conductor Artur Bodanzky.
  She sang in France, Italy, England and Germany. Other noted conductors under whom she sang included Edvard Grieg and Richard Strauss.
  She sang at the Metropolitan Opera in New York from 1912 to 1914, making her debut there as Azucena in Il trovatore. Other appearances there included Fricka in Die Walküre, alongside Olive Fremstad and Margaret Matzenauer.
  She enjoyed great success in Stockholm from 1915 to 1917, during which time she acquired Swedish citizenship. After retirement, she became a teacher and vocal coach, at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Her students, there and elsewhere, included Marian Anderson, Göta Ljungberg and Rosette Anday. It was on her advice that Lauritz Melchior changed from baritone to heldentenor.
  Sara Cahier died in Manhattan Beach, California, in April 1951.
caption: Cahier in 1912
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