Elizabeth Harwood
After a music school, she enjoyed an operatic career lasting for over two decades and worked with such conductors as Colin Davis and Herbert von Karajan.
She was one of the few English singers of her generation to be invited to sing in productions at the Salzburg Festival and La Scala, Milan, as well as at the Metropolitan Opera.
"[7] At a performance of Messiah in December 1960, Harwood's fellow soloists included Janet Baker, with whom she later made a series of critically praised appearances for Scottish Opera.
[8] In 1961 Sadler's Wells Opera Company engaged her, and she played Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto,[9] Countess Adèle in Rossini's Le Comte Ory,[10] and Phyllis in Gilbert and Sullivan's Iolanthe, in which the critic of The Gilbert and Sullivan Journal thought that "despite Elizabeth Harwood's beautiful singing, attractive costume and appearance, her spoken word was charged with innuendo, presenting a most worldly young lady".
[2] Of this period The Times said, "Here Colin Davis was one of the leading influences on a soprano who looked well on stage and sang with a sense of fun.
She rarely sang in modern operas, but an exception was as Bella in Michael Tippett's The Midsummer Marriage, where "her radiant stage appearance was seen to good effect in the high lyrical role".
Her success in this and in her Scottish Opera roles attracted the attention of Herbert von Karajan, who invited her to appear at the Salzburg Festival the following year.
[14] The Musical Times wrote of her, "Elizabeth Harwood's lovely, warm voice, with its effortless production and evenness throughout a remarkable range, was matched by her level-headed approach to the world of opera and the generous nature of her personality.
[22] She was a guest artist for Decca with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company in 1964 as Elsie in The Yeomen of the Guard and in the title role in Princess Ida.
[23] Under the baton of Karajan, she recorded the title role of The Merry Widow for Deutsche Grammophon, and Musetta in La bohème for Decca.
[25] She appeared in the 1985 Tony Palmer film about Handel God Rot Tunbridge Wells!, singing 'I know that my redeemer liveth' from Messiah.
[26] She had only one solo recital disc, a selection of English art songs by Frederick Delius, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Frank Bridge, Arnold Bax, Michael Head, George Lloyd, and Roger Quilter recorded in London in 1983, released on the Conifer label, with John Constable on the piano.
Another disc of traditional English songs such as Cherry Ripe and Early One Morning was a joint recital with baritone Owen Brannigan from 1964, conducted by Charles Mackerras.
