Pauline Viardot(1821-1910)
- Music Department
- Soundtrack
Born into a celebrated family of Spanish performers, Pauline Garcia
Viardot was initially lost in the shadow of her beautiful and talented
sister, Maria. But Maria's sudden death forced the 15-year-old Pauline
into the limelight, with astonishing results. She was hailed as a opera
singer par excellence, as well as a composer of no small talent. She
studied alongside Franz Liszt and was taught Russian by the poet Ivan Turgenev --
Turgenev fell completely under her spell and remained devoted to her
all his life. She married author and director Louis Viardot in 1840,
and had four children (some or all of which may have been Turgenev's).
Her career flourished in the 1840s, and in 1843 her good friend George Sand
wrote her into her novel "Consuelo" as its heroine. In 1863 Pauline
Viardot retired from the stage, and devoted herself to nursing both her
husband and Turgenev, who both died in 1883. She died peacefully in
1910 and was buried at Cimetière de Montmartre.