metropolitanopera

Homer Family This is a series of portraits of the family of composer Sidney Homer (1864-1953) and his wife contralto Louise Dilworth Homer née Beatty (1871-1947). Sidney Homer composed many of his songs with the voice of his famous wife in mind. Among his most famous songs are "A Banjo Song" (Weeden), "Requiem" (Stevenson), "Casey at the Bat" (Thayer), and "The House that Jack Built" ("Mother Goose.") Sidney was Louise's music theory teacher in Boston, MA. Louise Homer's European debut in 1898 was in Vichy, as Leonora in La Favorita, and in 1900 she made her American opera debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City singing Amneris in Verdi's Aida.  She sang at the Met for 19 consecutive seasons, often singing opposite such acclaimed singers as Enrico Caruso, Geraldine Farrar, and Ernestine Schumann-Heink.  Composer Samuel Barber was her nephew, and Louise performed several of his songs.  In 1923 and 1924 she was listed as one of the 12 greatest living women by the National League of Women Voters. They had six children, Louise Homer, Jr. (1896-1970) (Louise Homer Stires), son Sidney Homer, Jr. (1902-1983), twin daughters Anne Marie Homer (1907-1995) (Anne Homer Doerflinger) and Katharine Homer (1907-1997) ("Kay", Katharine Homer Fryer); and daughters Hester Makepeace Homer (b.1911) ("Miss Happy", Hester Homer Henry) and Helen Joy Homer (1915-1946) ("Joy", Joy Homer Doerflinger) There are currently 34 photographs of the Homer family in the Bain Collection on Flickr.  You can view them all here.   They were first identified by Art Siegel, B-59, pennylrichardsca (now at ipernity), Wystan, swanq, and Richard Norton.

Raymonde Delaunois, Belgian opera singer, a regular at the Met from 1914 to 1926, see

Delaunois was Tyltyl in the opera "L'oiseau bleu", s. The sun., December 14, 1919, Section 7 Magazine Section, Page 6, (photo) chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83030431/1919-12-14/ed-... and comment on www.flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/35919426325/

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karin_Branzell "Karin Branzell (24 September 1891 – 15 December 1974) was a Swedish operatic contralto (sometimes described as a mezzo-soprano), who had a prominent career at the Metropolitan Opera, New York, and in Europe. Her very wide range enabled her to sing both contralto roles and the occasional soprano role. She was particularly noted for her singing of the music of Richard Wagner, in roles such as Ortrud (Lohengrin), Venus (Tannhäuser), Erda (Das Rheingold and Siegfried), Brangäne (Tristan und Isolde), and Brunnhilde (Die Walküre). ... She first appeared at the Metropolitan Opera on 6 February 1924, singing Fricka in Die Walküre, and sang there every season until 1944. She returned for a farewell season in 1951, singing Erda in Rudolf Bing's first Ring cycle."

Thanks swanq for identifying another person despite the misspelling of their name. We'll update the catalog record.

Another photo: flic.kr/p/7UYxvv