Teyte, Maggie: A Vocal Portrait

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Cat No: 8110757-58

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Release Date: 31 March 2003

Label: Naxos - Historical / Naxos Historical

Packaging Type: Jewel Case

No of Units: 2

Barcode: 636943175729

Genres: Classical

Composer/Series: Teyte, Maggie

Description
GREAT SINGERS: Maggie Teyte (1888-1976)A Vocal PortraitThe significance of recording played a considerable part in reviving the career of Maggie Teyte in the mid-1930s. Following her divorce from her second husband, the American Sherwin Cottingham, in 1931, she attempted to revive her career that had been largely dormant during the previous decade. Unfortunately she seemed unable to find her proper course, landing up in music hall and variety which involved 24 performances a week at the Victoria Palace in London. She also appeared as Mrs Fitzherbert in an operetta By Appointment by Kennedy Russell that opened in the New Theatre in London on 11th October 1934. Two of the songs from the score appear in the present release. The success was short-lived and the production closed after a short run. Her future seemed uncertain. Then in 1935, Joe Brogan, an Irish-American record collector and dealer in New York City, wrote to EMI suggesting an album of French songs by Maggie Teyte for inclusion in their newly-formed series of Society Editions. The producer Walter Legge was not convinced but his superior Fred Gaisberg was much taken with the project and even suggested the distinguished French pianist Alfred Cortot as her accompanist. Their historic collaboration was cemented in March 1936 with the recording of Debussy to be found in this set. Such was the artistic and commercial success of these recordings, with Brogan alone selling over a thousand sets, that Teyte’s career was reborn. The artist, however, always claimed never to have had a gramophone. Born Margaret Tate on 17th April 1888 in Wolverhampton, Maggie Teyte was one of ten children from two marriages. Her half-brother, James William Tate, would become a composer who is now best remembered for his songs A Paradise for Two and A Bachelor Gay, which were included in Harold Fraser-Simson’s musical play The Maid of the Mountains in 1917. Tate died five years later, at the age of 46. His half-sister Margaret possessed an excellent memory and applied herself to music from an early age. After a short period of study at the Royal College of Music in London, she went to Paris in 1904 to work with the Polish tenor Jean de Reszke for two years, in time becoming his most successful pupil. She was a natural learner and quickly absorbed his teaching methods. It was also a particularly fortunate circumstance that she was able to work with Debussy, who was considered a most exacting taskmaster. Many years later Teyte would recall: "I studied the part of Mélisande with him every day over a period of five to six months. Whether my temperament or the colour of my voice had anything to do with it I do not know, but he never got angry with or corrected me, through all the lessons of Pelléas or his repertoire of songs". Her concert début as Margaret Tate was in Monte Carlo, while she was still studying, in 1907, the year which also saw her first appearance on the stage as Tyr
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