The Bulgarian-born but naturalised Italian mezzosoprano Elena Nicolai (1905-1993), christened Nikolova, was born in the village of Tzerovo in the Pazardzhin region in 1905. She studied at the Milan Conservatorio under Pintorno and made her ‘real’ début at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples as Annina in Der Rosenkavalier. Soon she was appearing throughout Italy in a variety of rôles that included Amneris, Laura (La Gioconda), Carmen, Ortrud and Eudosia in Respighi’s La Fiamma. She first sang at La Scala, Milan, in January 1942 as La Principessa di Bouillon in Adriana Lecouvreur and would continue in that house for the next decade. She made her English début as Mistress Quickly in Verdi’s Falstaff at the Cambridge Theatre in 1949, followed by engagements in France, Switzerland, Spain and South America (Rio de Janeiro). Nicolai achieved a particular success in the part of Starita in a production of Spontini’s Olympia at the 1950 Florence May Festival. She returned to her native Bulgaria on four occasions. She also sang the soprano rôle of Brünnhilde in Die Walküre in addition to taking part in the première of Pizzetti’s La Figlia di Jorio in 1954 at La Scala. She also had a short film career of six movies between 1963 and 1968. She died in Milan in October 1993.

Discography