Anne Brown, Gershwin's Original Bess, Passes Away at 96

The New York Times is reporting the sad news that Anne Brown, the soaring soprano who literally put the Bess in "Porgy and Bess" by inspiring George Gershwin to expand the part in his opera that was originally to be called "Porgy," died Friday in Oslo. Brown was 96.

Paula Schjelderup, her daughter announced her passing.

"Porgy and Bess" introduced songs that came to be lodged in American culture reports the Times. 

Anne Wiggins Brown was born in Baltimore on Aug. 9, 1912. Her father, a surgeon, was the grandson of slaves, and her mother was a music lover who played the piano daily. Legend had it that Ms. Brown could sing a perfect scale when she was 9 months old, The Washington Post reported in 1994.

White "Porgy and Bess" received mixed reviews in October 1935, Ms. Brown was praised. Olin Downes in The New York Times said her work was "a high point of interpretation." She went on to appear in the Broadway play "Mamba's Daughters" (1939), a revival of "Porgy" in 1942 and the Gershwin movie biography "Rhapsody in Blue" (1945), playing herself.

She performed extensively in Europe, South America and elsewhere, and taught voice for many years in a drama school in Oslo; one of her students was Liv Ullmann. Her own singing career was cut short by a lung illness in the 1950s.

In 1998, she received the George Peabody Medal for Outstanding Contributions to Music in America from the Peabody Institute. 

The New York York Times reports that Anne Brown is survived by her daughters Paula and Vaar Schjelderup; four grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.

To read the complete Times article on her passing click here.