May 08, (THEWILL) – American opera singer, Grace Bumbry, has died at age 86 in a hospital in Vienna.
According to Operawire, the singer’s adopted son, David Brewer, confirmed the news on Monday.
The mezzo-soprano singer died on Sunday, in Vienna, Austria. She suffered an acute ischemic stroke from a fall in October 2022 and was hospitalised.
Bumbry was the first black woman to sing at the Richard Wagner Festival in Bayreuth in 1961, and became a trailblazer for other black women in opera.
She was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on January 4, 1937, into a musical family. After winning a singing contest run by a local radio station, she later trained as a singer, earning scholarships along the way.
In 1959, she had her first concert in London, and a year later, she celebrated her opera debut in Paris.
Many more appearances followed, with her signature roles including Salome in Strauss’ eponymous work, as Lady Macbeth, and Princess Eboli in ‘Don Carlos’.
