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Grace Moore
Mary Willie Grace Moore (December 5, 1898 – January 26, 1947) was an American operatic lyric soprano and actress in musical theatre and film. She was nicknamed the "Tennessee Nightingale." Her films helped to popularize opera by bringing it to a larger audience. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in One Night of Love.
In 1947, Moore died in a plane crash at the age of 48. She published an autobiography in 1944 titled You're Only Human Once. In 1953, a film about her life was released titled So This Is Love starring Kathryn Grayson.
Moore was born Mary Willie Grace Moore, the daughter of Tessa Jane (née Stokely) and Richard Lawson Moore. She was born in the community of Slabtown (now considered part of Del Rio) in Cocke County, Tennessee. By the time she was two years old, her family had relocated to Knoxville, a move Moore later described as traumatic. She found urban life distasteful at the time. After several years in Knoxville, the family again relocated to Jellico, Tennessee, where Moore spent her adolescence. After attending Jellico High School, where she was captain of the girls basketball team (see monument photo in this article), she studied briefly at Ward-Belmont College in Nashville before moving to Washington, D.C., where she studied at Wilson-Greens School of Music in Chevy Chase, Maryland. She relocated to New York in 1919 to pursue her singing career and performed there in nightclubs to help pay for singing classes. Moore's first professional singing performance was at The Black Cat Café in Greenwich Village.
Grace Moore's first Broadway appearance was in 1920 in the musical revue Hitchy-Koo, by Jerome Kern. She also appeared in Suite Sixteen, Just a Minute, Town Gossip, and Up in the Clouds. In 1922 and 1923 she appeared in the second and third of Irving Berlin's series of four Music Box Revues. In the 1923 edition she and John Steel introduced Berlin's song "What'll I Do". When Moore sang "An Orange Grove in California", orange blossom perfume was wafted through the theater.
In 1932 she appeared on Broadway in the short-lived operetta The DuBarry by Karl Millöcker.
After training in France, Moore made her operatic debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City on February 7, 1928, singing the role of Mimì in Giacomo Puccini's La bohème. She then sang Juliette in Roméo et Juliette, which led to a European tour. She debuted at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on September 29, 1928 as Mimì, which she also performed in a Royal Command Performance at Covent Garden in London on June 6, 1935. During her sixteen seasons with the Metropolitan Opera, she sang in several Italian and French operas as well as the title roles in Tosca, Manon, and Louise. Louise was her favorite opera and is widely considered to have been her greatest role. She also sang in Carmen, Faust, Pagliacci, Gianni Schicchi, and others.
In the 1930s and 1940s she gave concert performances throughout the United States and Europe, performing a repertoire of operatic selections and other songs in German, French, Italian, Spanish, and English. During World War II, she was active in the USO, entertaining American troops abroad. In 1945 she sang Mimi to Nino Martini's Rodolfo in La bohème for the inaugural performance of the San Antonio Grand Opera Festival.
She also performed during and after WWII in support of Allied Forces. From the personal memoire of Lt. Gen. John C. H. Lee, on 24 July 1945: "After an early dinner drove in convoy to the Paris Opera House for the gala performance entitled "Pacifique 45" given by the French for the benefit of the families of French war veterans. The program laid particular emphasis on the war in Japan and included the showing of two films - "Fighting Lady" and "Iwo Jima" and the rendition of several songs and the French and American national anthems by Grace Moore. Seated in the box of honor were General Alphonse Juin, the French Minister of Information Jacques Soustelle, and a number of important American and French officers. It seemed to be a great success and was particularly appreciated by the crowd of some 20,000 gathered in the square outside the Opera House."
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Grace Moore
Mary Willie Grace Moore (December 5, 1898 – January 26, 1947) was an American operatic lyric soprano and actress in musical theatre and film. She was nicknamed the "Tennessee Nightingale." Her films helped to popularize opera by bringing it to a larger audience. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in One Night of Love.
In 1947, Moore died in a plane crash at the age of 48. She published an autobiography in 1944 titled You're Only Human Once. In 1953, a film about her life was released titled So This Is Love starring Kathryn Grayson.
Moore was born Mary Willie Grace Moore, the daughter of Tessa Jane (née Stokely) and Richard Lawson Moore. She was born in the community of Slabtown (now considered part of Del Rio) in Cocke County, Tennessee. By the time she was two years old, her family had relocated to Knoxville, a move Moore later described as traumatic. She found urban life distasteful at the time. After several years in Knoxville, the family again relocated to Jellico, Tennessee, where Moore spent her adolescence. After attending Jellico High School, where she was captain of the girls basketball team (see monument photo in this article), she studied briefly at Ward-Belmont College in Nashville before moving to Washington, D.C., where she studied at Wilson-Greens School of Music in Chevy Chase, Maryland. She relocated to New York in 1919 to pursue her singing career and performed there in nightclubs to help pay for singing classes. Moore's first professional singing performance was at The Black Cat Café in Greenwich Village.
Grace Moore's first Broadway appearance was in 1920 in the musical revue Hitchy-Koo, by Jerome Kern. She also appeared in Suite Sixteen, Just a Minute, Town Gossip, and Up in the Clouds. In 1922 and 1923 she appeared in the second and third of Irving Berlin's series of four Music Box Revues. In the 1923 edition she and John Steel introduced Berlin's song "What'll I Do". When Moore sang "An Orange Grove in California", orange blossom perfume was wafted through the theater.
In 1932 she appeared on Broadway in the short-lived operetta The DuBarry by Karl Millöcker.
After training in France, Moore made her operatic debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City on February 7, 1928, singing the role of Mimì in Giacomo Puccini's La bohème. She then sang Juliette in Roméo et Juliette, which led to a European tour. She debuted at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on September 29, 1928 as Mimì, which she also performed in a Royal Command Performance at Covent Garden in London on June 6, 1935. During her sixteen seasons with the Metropolitan Opera, she sang in several Italian and French operas as well as the title roles in Tosca, Manon, and Louise. Louise was her favorite opera and is widely considered to have been her greatest role. She also sang in Carmen, Faust, Pagliacci, Gianni Schicchi, and others.
In the 1930s and 1940s she gave concert performances throughout the United States and Europe, performing a repertoire of operatic selections and other songs in German, French, Italian, Spanish, and English. During World War II, she was active in the USO, entertaining American troops abroad. In 1945 she sang Mimi to Nino Martini's Rodolfo in La bohème for the inaugural performance of the San Antonio Grand Opera Festival.
She also performed during and after WWII in support of Allied Forces. From the personal memoire of Lt. Gen. John C. H. Lee, on 24 July 1945: "After an early dinner drove in convoy to the Paris Opera House for the gala performance entitled "Pacifique 45" given by the French for the benefit of the families of French war veterans. The program laid particular emphasis on the war in Japan and included the showing of two films - "Fighting Lady" and "Iwo Jima" and the rendition of several songs and the French and American national anthems by Grace Moore. Seated in the box of honor were General Alphonse Juin, the French Minister of Information Jacques Soustelle, and a number of important American and French officers. It seemed to be a great success and was particularly appreciated by the crowd of some 20,000 gathered in the square outside the Opera House."