Maria Olszewska

Maria Olszewska was a German contralto who studied in Munich and made her operatic debut as a Page in Tannhäuser at Krefeld in 1915. After an engagement at Leipzig she sang at the Hamburg State Opera, where she took part in the joint premiere, with Cologne, of Korngold's Die tote Stadt in 1920, and created a Voice from Above in the premiere of Strauss's Die Frau ohne Schatten at Vienna the previous year. She sang regularly in Vienna from 1921 to 1930 and appeared frequently at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich and at Covent Garden from 1924 to 1932, where her Fricka, Ortrud, Brangäne and Herodias drew the highest critical acclaim; her Octavian and Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus were also highly regarded, though her Carmen and Amneris less so. She sang in Chicago from 1928 to 1932 and at the Metropolitan Opera from 1933 to 1935. She married the baritone Emil Schipper.