Performance · Other credits

Betty Allen

Betty Allen is credited on 141 releases across 27 albums tracked on Gatefold, active 1955–2021 — the collector-built map of who actually made the music.

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141

Pressings credited

27

Albums

8

Decades active

1

In collections

Biography

Betty Allen (March 17, 1927 – June 22, 2009) was an American operatic mezzo-soprano who had an active international singing career during the 1950s through the 1970s. In the latter part of her career her voice acquired a contralto-like darkening, which can be heard on her recording of Sergei Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky with conductor Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra. She was known for her collaborations with American composers, such as Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, David Diamond, Ned Rorem, and Virgil Thomson among others. Allen was part of the first generation of black opera singers to achieve wide success and is viewed as part of an instrumental group of performers who helped break down the barriers of racial prejudice in the opera world. She was greatly admired by Bernstein and the conductor notably chose her to be the featured soloist for his final performances as music director of the New York Philharmonic in 1973. After her singing career ended, she became a lauded voice teacher and arts administrator.

Bio from Wikipedia

Credited work

141 releases · 27 albums · active 1955–2021

  • Performance · 155
  • Other credits · 20

Studios: RCA Victor's Music Center Of The World · United Recording Studios · RCA Studio A · Berliner Philharmonie

Discography

Records they worked on — most-collected first.

Frequent collaborators

Around the web

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