Now That Pinza . . .

At the precocious age of 17 she became a Metropolitan Opera diva. At that point, pert little Patrice Munsel thought her career was dead ahead down a straight & narrow path. She would dutifully trill her way through all the Met's coloratura roles, and by the time she was a creaky 25, "I would know it all, retire, get married and start having children." She is 25 now, and neither retired, married nor creaky. But she has learned that, "starting as young as I did, your career is apt to take a funny turn or two."

Patrice's career took one such turn at the Met last season. Singing her first Zerlina in Don Giovanni, she left Met audiences goggle-eyed: the prodigy had become a person. Her Zerlina was so appealing, apt and masterful that it almost seemed as if Mozart had written it for her. On the strength of that performance, Met Manager Rudolf Bing has assigned her a prize role next season in the Met's first Fledermaus in 45 years.

In San Francisco last week, Patrice was taking another turn, and at high speed. In her first major venture into show business, she was lifting listeners out of their seats with a pyrotechnical performance of the title role in Rudolf Friml's Rose Marie. Singing with "exquisite coloratura," she made some of Friml's most overworked ballads sound good. Wrote the San Francisco News's Emilia Hodel: "We would have considered it impossible for anyone ever again to make us enjoy Indian Love Call, but Patrice . . . made the song not only lovely but exciting."

Now that Ezio Pinza "has shown there is a place on Broadway for serious voices," Patrice is even thinking seriously of going there herself. Says she: "I'm an incurable ham, and nothing gives me a bigger kick than getting a laugh or bringing the house down with a song."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.