Cécile Gilly
Cécile Gilly | |
|---|---|
| Born | Cécile Marie Puyo |
| Nationality | French |
| Other names | Cecile Roma |
| Occupation | voice teacher |
| Spouse(s) | Dinh Gilly, ex-husband |
Cécile Gilly (known on the stage as Cecile Roma, born approximately 1891[1]) was a French mezzo-soprano and singing teacher. A well-known pedagogue in the 1920s and 1930s, she is known primarily as being the voice teacher of soprano Marjorie Lawrence.
Biography
Cécile Marie Puyo was the daughter of Armand Crosper Puyo and Guerite Lydie Legall.[2][3] She married the baritone Dinh Gilly on 20 July 1902.[2] On the manifest for Cécile and Dinh Gilly's voyage to New York (to prepare for their debuts at the Metropolitan Opera), the manifest states that they were living in Paris on Villa Reine-Henriette Colombe.[1]
Singing career
Cécile and Dinh Gilly arrived in New York on 23 October 1909.[1] Under the stage name Cecile Roma, Cécile made her Met Opera company debut on December 14, 1909 in the role of Amarante of Charles Lecocq's La fille de Madame Angot, the company appearing at the New Theatre.[4] Other roles with the company included the Priestess in Aida and Lola in Cavalleria Rusticana.[5] When the Met appeared in Paris on tour, Cécile appeared with the company and stayed in France, while Dinh continued his American career and began an affair with soprano Emmy Destinn.
Teaching career
Marjorie Lawrence's autobiography, Interrupted Melody[6] is the main source of information on Gilly's approach to vocal pedagogy. Ironically, it was John Brownlee, student of Dinh Gilly, who suggested that Lawrence study with his former wife. By the time Marjorie Lawrence became her student in 1928, Cécile Gilly had developed a noted reputation as a singing teacher.[7]
Lawrence described starting her study with Gilly with "nothing but scales and exercises." This continued for "day after day for many weeks."[8] When she was ready to take on repertoire, Gilly had Lawrence start with arias by Rossini and Mozart "calculated still further to strengthen my technque."[8] Lawrence summarized "...Madame Gilly never was satisfied. Any pupil with possibilities who studied with her had her nose kept to the grindstone."[8] Lawrence also wrote about Gilly's holistic approach to becoming a professional singer and did much to steer Lawrence in the direction of gaining cultural and social education.[9]
Lawrence briefly mentioned Gilly's difficult life through giving up a potential singing career in order to have children, only to have her husband abandon her and thus having to support herself as a voice teacher. It was with such empathy that Lawrence recounts that Gilly had to take on students with substandard talent. This included one of Gilly's more notorious students, Ganna Walska. In an unintentionally humorous page, Lawrence described the extremely affluent Walska as almost completely lacking musical talent, but Gilly maintaining her as a student due to significant financial remuneration.[10][11]
In his biography of Marjorie Lawrence, Richard Harding Davis provides additional detail underscoring Cécile Gilly's difficult life. The estrangement between Cécile and Dinh was not total. Occasionally Dinh would show up at Cécile's house, resulting in two additional children.[7] During the World War II occupation of Paris, she lived at her estate in Euse. Her son Max was a prisoner of war, and her daughter Yvonne had recently died of blood poisoning, leaving Yvonne's three children (one of whom was only four months old) to be cared for by Cécile. Another one of Cecile's children, Paulette, had left the care of her twins to Cécile; another daughter, Renée, had left one child with Cécile. This put Cécile in charge of six grandchildren.[12]
Students
Cécile Gilly's students included:
- Morva Davies[13]
- Dorothy Gadsden[13]
- Renée Gilly[14]
- Gertrude Hutton[13]
- Doris Irwin[15]
- Marjorie Lawrence[15]
- Rita Miller[13]
- Gladys Petrie[16]
- Clarence Russell[17]
- Sam Waagenaar[12]
- Ganna Walska[10]
Dedication
Composer Philippe Gaubert dedicated his song "Musique sur l'eau" from the cycle Au jardin de l'infante to Gilly.[18]
References
- ^ a b c "Dinh Gilly", in New York Passenger Arrival Lists (Ellis Island), 1892-1924 on FamilySearch.org, image 68 of 830.
- ^ a b "Cécile Marie Puyo" in "Perfitt Family Tree" on Ancestry.com Dinh Gilly's marriage to Edith Furmedge also states that Cécile's original surname was Puyo. (access with subscription)
- ^ Richard Harding Davis quotes from an unsourced article and states her maiden name was "Roma." On their family tree, the descendants of Dinh Gilly and his second wife Edith Furmedge indicate that Cécile's original name was Cécile Marie Puyo.
- ^ "Le fille de Madame Angot," December 14, 1909, MetOpera Database, CID: 45560.
- ^ Name Search For: Roma, Cecile, in MetOpera Database.
- ^ Lawrence 1949.
- ^ a b Davis 2012, p. 37.
- ^ a b c Lawrence 1949, p. 63.
- ^ Lawrence 1949, p. 65.
- ^ a b Lawrence 1949, p. 63-64.
- ^ Walska does not mention Gilly in her autobiography Always Room At The Top (New York : R.R. Smith, 1943).
- ^ a b Davis 2012, p. 143.
- ^ a b c d Williams 2002, p. 103.
- ^ "Gilly, Renée," K.J. Kutsch, Leo Riemens, Grosses Sangerlexikon, Vierte, erweiterete und aktualisierte Auflage (München: K.G. Sauer, 2003), vol. 3, p. 1730.
- ^ a b Williams 2002, p. 118.
- ^ Davis 2012, p. 40.
- ^ "Music Careers Disrupted by War; 2 Return," Southeast Economist (Feb. 13, 1941), p. 3.
- ^ Philippe Gaubert, Au jardin de l'infante (Paris: Heugel, 1912).
Works consulted
- Davis, Richard Michael (2012). Wotan's Daughter: The Life of Marjorie Lawrence. Kent Town, S. Australia: Wakefield Press. ISBN 9781743052105.
- Lawrence, Marjorie (1949). Interrupted Melody: an Autobiography. Sydney: Invincible Press.
- Williams, Beth Mary (2002), Lineages of Vocal Pedagogy in Australia, 1850-1950, Melbourne: University of Melbourne