Background and career
Leontyne Price ( LEE-ən-teen, lee-ON-teen; born Mary Violet Leontine Price, February 10, 1927) is an American singer who was the first African-American soprano to receive international acclaim. From 1961 she began a long association with the Metropolitan Opera, becoming the first Black singer to maintain a sustained relationship with the company. She regularly appeared at the world's major opera houses, including the Vienna State Opera, the Royal Opera House, San Francisco Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and La Scala. She was particularly renowned for her performances of the title role in Giuseppe Verdi's Aida. Born in Laurel, Mississippi, Price studied at Wilberforce University and the Juilliard School with Florence Kimball. Price's first significant professional engagement was in Virgil Thomson's Four Saints in Three Acts which she performed both on Broadway and in Paris. Later that same year she starred in the third revival of George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, and would marry her co-star, bass-baritone William Warfield. She began a long association with composer Samuel Barber in 1953 when she performed the world premiere of his Hermit Songs with the composer as her accompanist at the Library of Congress. In 1955 Price became the first African American to star in a televised opera when she portrayed the title role in Puccini's Tosca with the NBC Opera Theatre. This event was widely viewed as a significant moment in breaking the color barrier for black opera singers who were historically barred from appearing on the opera stage. This televised performance, along with appearances at the San Francisco Opera as Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmélites and Aida, brought her to international attention. She went on to sing at many of the world's major opera houses with Aida, before her successful debut at the Metropolitan Opera (Met) in 1961, as Leonora in Verdi's Il trovatore. Continuing her career there, she starred in a multitude of operas for 20 years, securing her place among the leading performers of the century. One of these works was Barber's Antony and Cleopatra, which she starred in for its world premiere. She made her farewell opera performance at the Met in 1985 in Aida. In interviews, Price referred to her own voice as that of a lyric soprano, although scholars have variously described her as a dramatic or spinto soprano instead. Price's musical interpretations were subtle and often overshadowed her acting. She was noted for her roles in operas by Mozart and Puccini, as well as playing Cleopatra in Handel's Giulio Cesare and Poppea in Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea. However, the "middle period" operas of Verdi remain her greatest triumph: Aida, the Leonoras of Il trovatore and La forza del destino, as well as Amelia in Un ballo in maschera. Her performances in these works, as well as Mozart and Puccini's operas, survive in her many recordings. After her retirement from opera, Price continued to appear in recitals and orchestral concerts until 1998. After that, she would come out of retirement to sing at special events, including a memorial concert at Carnegie Hall, in 2001 for victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Among her many honors and awards are the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1964, in addition to her 13 Grammy Awards.
Mary Violet Leontine Price was born in Laurel, Mississippi, on February 10, 1927. Her parents gave her the middle name Leontine after the name Leon, a name chosen by her parents to honor her father's best friend whose name was Leon. Her mother proposed this feminized version of the name. Her brother and only sibling, George, was born in 1929. He grew up to become a brigadier general in the United States Army, and lived until 2024 when he died at the age of 95. Price's father, James Anthony Price, worked in the timber industry and was employed in the sawmills in Laurel. He also worked as a part-time carpenter. Her mother, Katherine Viola Price (née Baker), was a licensed practical nurse and midwife who delivered hundreds of babies in Laurel and the surrounding region. Her parents were both deeply religious, and her grandparents on both sides of the family were Methodist ministers. Singer Dionne Warwick has said that she is a cousin of Price on her maternal side. When Price was born during racial segregation in the United States that impacted her childhood, and the enforcement of Jim Crow laws was a reality of everyday life in Mississippi. At that time black Americans were unable to share spaces like schools, churches, restaurants, restrooms, and theaters with white Americans. She lived with her family in the south side of Laurel which was where all of the town's black residents lived. The Price family home was situated in the middle class section of Laurel's black community. She attended all-black schools throughout her childhood; including Sandy Gavin Elementary School. The family's church, Saint Paul's Methodist Church, was an all-black church. Her mother was a talented amateur singer who sang as a soloist in Saint Paul's church choir, and Leontyne grew up singing alongside her mother in this choral group. Her father played a tuba in the church band.
Price showed a natural affinity for music at an early age and began piano lessons at the age of three and a half with the local pianist Hattie McInnis. McInnis was one of the few African American music teachers that had studied under composer Carl Orff; a man known for developing the Orff Schulwerk approach to music education. Initially, she played on a toy piano, but by the time she was five, her parents traded in the family phonograph as the down payment on an upright piano. She studied with McInnis for more than twelve years; taking both piano and voice lessons with her. Her piano skills were further honed at Saint Paul's Methodist Church where she played regularly for Sunday school and at church services. Leontyne's aunt, Evelina Greer, lived with her family and was employed as a maid in the home of Alexander and Elizabeth Chisholm; a wealthy white family living in the north part of Laurel. Elizabeth Chisholm (née Wisner) was the daughter of a wealthy lumber magnate, and Greer had worked for the Wisner family prior to her marriage to Alexander Chisholm, a successful banker. In a 1955 interview, Elizabeth Chisholm said that Greer had taken care of her when she was a little girl and had worked for her family for forty-five years. From an early age, Leontyne and her brother would often accompany their aunt when she went to work at the Chisholm home. The Chisholm family had children of about the same age as Leontyne and her brother, and the Price and Chisholm children became close friends. In particular, Leontyne and George were close with the Chisholms' older daughters, Jean and Margaret Ann (aka Peggy), and Leontyne referred to herself as their "chocolate sister". Their parents also became friends with the Chisholms, and the Prices considered the Chisholms their "other family". Price maintained a friendship with Peggy Chisholm, with Price describing her as her best friend in a 1981 interview. Peggy died in New York in 1991. Mrs. Chisholm was a trained pianist, and encouraged Leontyne's piano-playing and singing, often inviting her to sing at house parties. The Chisholm family gave Leontyne access to their phonograph and record collection which is how she experienced listening to opera for the first time. Aged nine, she was taken on a school trip to hear Marian Anderson sing a recital in Jackson. The experience was her first significant exposure to live classical music, and she later recalled: "The whole aura of the occasion had a tremendous effect on me, particularly the singer's dignity and, of course, her voice." Multiple commentators asserted that this event galvanized Price's interest in a musical career. As a teenager, Price attended Oak Park Vocational High School (OPVHS) where she graduated in 1944 as salutatorian of her class. At OPVHS she was a cheerleader and a drum majorette in the school's band. She also sang in school choral groups, played piano for the school choir, and performed as a soloist at school events. During her high school years she earned extra money by singing for funerals and civic functions, and was a popular performer at civic and church events within Laurel's black community. She gave her first solo recital at Sandy Gavin School Auditorium on December 17, 1943 during which she sang and played classical piano music.
Price received her undergraduate education in Wilberforce, Ohio at the College of Education and Industrial Arts where she began her studies in the Fall 1944 semester at the age of 17. At that time, the school operated as a department inside Wilberforce University, a historically Black institution. Some sources erroneously claim that she enrolled at Central State University in 1944, but that institution did not formally exist until 1947 and was not known as Central State University until 1951. Price attended Wilberforce University on a full four year scholarship. She changed the spelling of her name to Leontyne while she was studying at Wilberforce. In June 1947, the summer before Price's senior year, the College of Education and Industrial Arts broke away from Wilberforce University to become its own separate institution known as the State College of Education and Industrial Arts at Wilberforce (now known as Central State University). Price graduated from the State College of Education and Industrial Arts at Wilberforce on June 3, 1948. Price enrolled in Wilberforce University as a music education major where her primary instrument was initially the piano. Multiple sources claim that she changed her major to vocal performance; however Price stated in a 1981 interview that her Bachelor degree was in music education as her family felt she needed a backup in case performance didn't work out. She did however, change her focus of study to voice, and her vocal training at Wilberforce was as a mezzo-soprano at this institution. The decision to make this shift was done after she filled in for a sick singer in a glee club concert in her sophomore year to which she received much positive feedback. Prior to this she had only performed in ensembles at Wilberforce as an accompanist and had never sung at the university. Price stated in a 1981 interview that this moment was the "discovery of her voice". Wilberforce president Charles H. Wesley, along with several of her music professors and classmates convinced her to change her focus to vocal music with Price stating she made this change in her sophomore year. In her junior year at the school Price determined that she should attempt to pursue a singing career. Price credited a visiting pianist to Wilberforce with influencing her decision to abandon a teaching vocation for a singing career. That individual also convinced her that she was a soprano after she had the opportunity to perform and rehearse with the pianist. Some reference works state that Price studied singing with Catherine Van Buren at Wilberforce. However, newspapers covering vocal competitions she won while a student, state that she was a voice student of Clarice Estell at the university. At Wilberforce, Price was a member of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority. She sang and toured in the Wilberforce Singers at the same time that the ensemble's membership included opera singer Betty Allen who was also Price's roommate at Wilberforce. She was also a member of the Wilberforce Women's Glee Club under directors Flora Isabel Askew and Marie Ware. In 1946 she was the soloist in Théodore Dubois's Les Sept paroles du Christ (The Seven Last Words of Christ) with the Wilberforce University Choir conducted by Charles Henri Woode. I In December 1947 Price was one of the soloists in George Frideric Handel's Messiah in a joint presentation of the oratorio by the choirs of Wilberforce and Antioch College which was conducted by Antioch music professor Walter Franklin Anderson (1915-2003). In a 1981 interview with Opera News editor Robert M. Jacobsen, Price recalled the irony that she, who became a famous soprano, was the contralto soloist in this production while Allen, who became a famous mezzo-soprano, was the soprano soloist in the oratorio. In 1948 she starred in Wilberforce's production of Millard Lampell's ballad opera The Lonesome Train which they toured to Delaware for performances at a folk festival held on the campus of Wilmington College. In Spring 1947, while a junior in the music department at Wilberforce, Price won first prize in the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity inter-collegiate music competition held on the campus of the University of Cincinnati. Her repertoire at this competition included the soprano aria "Vissi d'arte" from Tosca. Later in the year, while a senior at the school, she placed third in the American Music Festival competition in Chicago which was sponsored by The Chicago Defender. She, and the competition's other two winners, performed in concert at Comiskey Park, home of the Chicago White Sox, as part of the festival on July 25, 1947 in front of a crowd of 20,000 people. At this time she was billed as a mezzo-soprano.
Price decided she wanted to pursue further studies in singing at the Juilliard School while an undergraduate student in Wilberforce. She was prompted to do so by Mrs. Anna M. Terry, then head of Wilberforce's music department, who advised Price to apply and obtained an application form to Juilliard for her. She did and was accepted. Administrators at the State College of Education and Industrial Arts wanted to support Price financially in this endeavor, and a Leontyne Price Fund was formally organized by the school to help provide funds towards this goal. The renowned bass Paul Robeson was an important early supporter of Price who lent his talents to help raise money for this fund, and together Robeson and Price sang in a 1948 benefit concert which raised $1,000.00 for her Juilliard education. Robeson first became aware of Price after hearing her sing while visiting Wilberforce in 1946. She later participated in master classes with Robeson at Antioch College. While the benefit concert did raise money for Price's Juilliard tuition, it was nowhere close to the funds she needed to attend the school. Price's parents were not able to support her financially because they were paying for her brother's undergraduate education which was just beginning, and were not able to afford both tuitions simultaneously. The Chisholm family remained supportive of Price, and according to some sources they paid for the majority of her tuition while she was a graduate student at Juilliard after obtaining permission from Price's parents to do so. Other sources state that Price won a scholarship to Juilliard which paid for her tuition, but that the Chisholms paid for her living expenses such as rent and food, and for materials she needed for her studies. In a 1981 interview, Price stated that she was given a partial and not full time scholarship to Juilliard and that the Chisholms paid for the bulk of her expenses during her first three years at the institution. The story of the Chisholm family's generosity was widely publicized in the press, to the point that some have criticized the news coverage of propagating a White savior narrative that overlooked the impact of Price's own agency, hard work, and talent had on her achievements. Critics in the Black community in Laurel have also pointed to the many African Americans in Laurel ranging from teachers, ministers, neighbors, members of black churches, and fellow black musicians among others who rallied behind her in a network of support. Yet, the Chisholm family's support of Price was based in genuine friendship, with Margaret Ann Chisholm remaining one of Price's closest longterm friends. Price herself, expressed frustration with the news coverage of the Chisholm family's support with her pointed comments emphasizing that the coverage had overlooked the contributions that her own family had made towards her success, including taking out a mortgage on the family home. Price stated the following in a 1976 interview:
The Press has made too much of that legend. I love Miss Chisholm; she was here only last month. Her daughter Margaret Ann and I are best friends. But the Chisholms got exposure because of the racial angle. I guess it makes me angry because it denies the sacrifices my parents made for me. In a 2012 interview, Price criticized the press coverage of her relationship with the Chisholms as being mischaracterized. She emphasized the importance of the absence of paternalism in her relationship with the Chisholm family, and described what one historian summarized as the "strangeness of real relationships between Blacks and whites in the American South in the first century after slavery." She also stressed in another interview that she herself contributed to her financial expenses; working multiple jobs while a student at Juilliard. One of these was working as a paid singer at various churches in Manhattan, including Riverside Church.
