Editing Eva Turner (section)

==Life and career==
===Early years===
Eva Turner was born on 10 March 1892 in [[Werneth, Greater Manchester|Werneth]], [[Oldham]], the elder child and only daughter of Charles Turner, chief engineer of a cotton mill, and his wife, Elizabeth, ''née'' Park.<ref name=odnb>[[John Tooley|Tooley, John]]. [https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/39917 "Turner, Dame Eva (1892–1990)"], ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004  {{ODNBsub}}</ref> She attended Werneth council school until she was ten, when the family moved to Bristol.<ref name=odnb/>

In Bristol, Turner was taken to her first opera, ''[[Il trovatore]]'', performed by the [[Carl Rosa Opera Company|Carl Rosa Company]] in 1903. She decided that she wished to make opera her career, and was supported by her parents, who paid for her to take lessons with the [[bass (voice)|bass]] Daniel Rootham, who had been teacher to [[Clara Butt]].<ref name=d251>Douglas, p. 251</ref> At the age of nineteen Turner started a four-year course at the [[Royal Academy of Music]], where she sang in [[Alexander Mackenzie (composer)|Sir Alexander Mackenzie's]] opera ''The Cricket on the Hearth''.<ref>Douglas, pp. 251–252; and "The Cricket on the Hearth", ''The Musical Times'', 1 July 1914, p. 460.</ref> While a student she was briefly betrothed, but the wedding did not take place, and she never married.<ref>Griffiths, Bryan. "Memories of a great friend", ''The Times'', 18 June 1990, p. 21</ref>

Towards the end of her time at the academy Turner auditioned for Walter van Noorden, proprietor and conductor of  the opera company that had fired her imagination in Bristol. He offered her a place in the chorus, with the prospect of promotion to solo parts.<ref name=d252>Douglas, p. 252</ref> She began to study with Albert Richards-Broad, who had recently joined the management of the Carl Rosa Company. He had sung as a bass under [[Hans Richter (conductor)|Hans Richter]] at [[Royal Opera House|Covent Garden]], and was an authority on voice production. He remained her coach, adviser and friend until his death, twenty-five years later.<ref name=odnb/>

Over the next five years Turner was allotted increasingly important roles as her voice gained weight and power. In 1920 the company gave a four-week season at Covent Garden, in which she sang Santuzza (''[[Cavalleria rusticana]]''), Musetta (''[[La bohème]]''), Leonora (''Il trovatore''), Butterfly (''[[Madama Butterfly]]''), Antonia (''[[The Tales of Hoffmann]]''), and Venus (''[[Tannhäuser (opera)|Tannhäuser]]'').<ref name=odnb/> ''[[The Times]]'' described her Leonora as promising although needing to be sung more freely, ''[[The Stage]]'' praised her vivacity as Musetta, and ''[[The Era (newspaper)|The Era]]'' found her Santuzza "remarkable" and "brilliant".<ref>"Il Trovatore at Covent Garden", ''The Times'', 6 December 1920; "Covent Garden", ''The Stage'', 2 December 1920, p. 16; and "Covent Garden Opera", ''The Era'', 1 December 1920, p. 2</ref> The following year the company returned to Covent Garden for a seven-week season, during which Turner sang all her 1920 roles and added Fricka in ''[[Das Rheingold]]'', Brünnhilde in ''[[Die Walküre]]'' and ''[[Siegfried]]'', Elsa in ''[[Lohengrin]]'', the title-role in ''[[Aida]]'' and Jeanette in a short-lived one-act piece called ''Le chant fatal''.<ref name=d2523/>

===International career===
{{Quote box |bgcolor=#FFFFF0 |salign=right| quote = Nowadays British opera singers appear with gratifying frequency in leading houses all over the world. Between the two world wars there was only one of whom that could be said – Eva Turner | source =  Nigel Douglas, ''Legendary Voices'' (1993)<ref name=d251/>| align=right| width=25%}}
Further London seasons followed, between provincial tours. In 1924 the Carl Rosa Company was in the [[West End theatre|West End]] for a four-week season, which became a turning point in Turner's career. Her performance as Butterfly impressed [[Ettore Panizza]], [[Arturo Toscanini]]'s assistant at [[La Scala|La Scala, Milan]]. Panizza arranged for her to sing for Toscanini, who declared, "Bella voce, bella pronuncia, bella figura",{{refn|"Beautiful voice, beautiful pronunciation, beautiful figure"|group=n}} and offered her the roles of Freia in ''Das Rheingold'' and Sieglinde in ''Die Walküre'' in La Scala's forthcoming season.<ref name=d2523>Douglas, pp. 252–253</ref> The Carl Rosa management released her from her contract to allow her to begin an international career.<ref name=odnb/> Her last appearance with the Carl Rosa Company was in Bristol, where she had seen her first opera twenty-three years previously.<ref>"Miss Eva Turner", ''Western Daily Press'', 26 September 1924, p. 4</ref>

After the La Scala season, Turner joined another Italian company touring Germany.<ref name=grove>Rosenthal, Harold, and Alan Blyth. [https://doi.org/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.28620 "Turner, Dame Eva"], ''Grove Music Online'', Oxford University Press, 2001 {{subscription required}}</ref> As her international career progressed she appeared in opera houses around Italy, in other European countries and in North and South America.<ref name=odnb/> She had a villa built to her own design in  [[Brusino Arsizio]] on [[Lake Lugano]], where she based herself when performing in Italy.<ref name=lv>"Lakeside Villa", ''Aberdeen Evening Express'', 16 September 1939, p. 4</ref> As English opera singers were not at that time highly regarded internationally it was suggested to Turner that she might change her name, but as her biographer [[John Tooley|Sir John Tooley]] comments, "Proud of her [[Lancashire|Lancastrian]] roots, she refused".<ref name=odnb/>

Although she was celebrated for her Aida, the part with which Turner became most closely identified was the title role in [[Giacomo Puccini|Puccini's]] ''[[Turandot]]''. [[Franco Alfano]], who completed the opera after Puccini's death, considered her the ideal singer of the part.<ref name=grove/> She was in the audience for the premiere at La Scala in April 1926 and first sang the part in December of that year at the Teatro Grande in [[Brescia]].<ref>Douglas, p. 256</ref> In 1928 she performed the role at [[Royal Opera House|Covent Garden]] (also playing Aida and Santuzza during the season). ''The Times'' and ''[[The Musical Times]]'' both expressed reservations about the opera but praised Turner's performance.<ref>"Turandot", ''The Times'', 30 May 1929</ref><ref name=mt>"Italian Opera", ''The Musical Times'', June 1928, p. 648</ref> The latter reported:
{{blockindent|She let loose again and again a stream of tone brilliant as a trumpet's, without a tremor or a shade of uncertainty. It was marvellous singing; an achievement comparable with the [[violin|fiddling]] of a [[Jascha Heifetz|Heifetz]] … it is unlikely that in that part any soprano in the world can match her.<ref name=mt/>}} 
In 1929 she took the part at La Scala. Recordings of her Turandot recorded live at Covent Garden in 1937 with [[Giovanni Martinelli]] as Calaf and [[John Barbirolli]] conducting remained unissued at the time but were released on CD in the 1980s.<ref>Ulrich, Allan. [https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-06-04-ca-2315-story.html "Puccini: Turandot (excerpts)], ''The Los Angeles Times'', 4 June 1989</ref>

In 1938 Turner was among the sixteen leading singers of the day for whom [[Ralph Vaughan Williams]] composed his ''[[Serenade to Music]]'', honouring the conductor  [[Henry Wood|Sir Henry Wood]]. Each singer had his or her own solo in between singing together. A recording of the work, conducted by Wood immediately after the premiere, captures Turner's voice in what the musical scholar [[Christopher Palmer]] calls "the great soaring solo 'How many things by season season'd are to their right praise and true perfection!'".<ref>Palmer, Christopher (1990). Notes to Hyperion CD CDA66420</ref>

When the [[Second World War]] began on 3 September 1939 Turner was at Brusino Arsizio, from where she crossed into Switzerland and made her way to England, determined to appear as contracted at Wood's Covent Garden concert on 25 September.<ref name=lv/><ref name=d259>Douglas, p. 259</ref> She spent the war years singing in concerts for the armed forces and the radio, and at the [[the Proms|Proms]]. She declined invitations to work in America.<ref name=odnb/>

During the war there was no opera at Covent Garden. When peace came, it was decided to abandon the pre-war practice of starry internationally cast seasons in favour of a resident company performing year-round and singing in English. This was a controversial decision, and the fledgling company of largely unknown singers received a considerable boost when Turner accepted an invitation from the director of the company, [[David Webster (opera manager)|David Webster]], to sing in ''Turandot'', for which she learned the role in English translation. Webster's biographer Montague Haltrecht writes:
{{blockindent|… to Webster she represented the level of achievement he was aiming at. He watched the faces of his young artists as they listened to her huge voice, which was still capable of rolling thrillingly round his theatre. They turned awe-struck to look at the rather short figure in their midst from whom it came. She was warm, friendly, encouraging. Yes, she represented their level of aspiration. Just as Webster had wanted.<ref>Haltrecht, p. 105</ref>|}}
The critic in ''[[The Daily Telegraph]]'' said that Turner astonished the entire audience.<ref>"Turandot", ''The Daily Telegraph'', 30 May 1947, p. 8</ref> In the company's first two seasons she sang Turandot fourteen times in London and another fourteen on tour.<ref name=d259/>

===Later years===
At that point Turner had no intention of retiring from the stage, but in 1949 she received an invitation from the [[University of Oklahoma]] to undertake a year's professorship. Gradually the one year extended into ten. After that she returned to London to teach at her ''[[alma mater]]'', the Royal Academy of Music, and privately.<ref name=grove/> Among those who studied with her in the US and England were [[Roberta Knie]], [[Amy Shuard]], [[Rita Hunter]], [[Linda Esther Gray]], [[Pauline Tinsley]] and [[Eric Garrett]]. Tooley writes that Turner passed on "her wealth of experience with her inimitable generosity but also with a ferocious expectation of hard work and high standards in return".<ref name=odnb/> In the 1980s, [[Gwyneth Jones (soprano)|Gwyneth Jones]] studied the role of Turandot with her and remained a devoted friend throughout Turner's last years.<ref name=times>"Dame Eva Turner", ''The Times'', 18 June 1990, p. 14</ref>

Turner's ninetieth birthday was celebrated with a gala at Covent Garden, which included contributions, some spoken, some sung, by [[Geraint Evans]], [[Tito Gobbi]], [[Ljuba Welitsch]], [[Victoria de los Angeles]], [[Isobel Baillie]], [[John Gielgud]] and several star singers of the younger generation, including [[Valerie Masterson]], [[John Tomlinson (bass)|John Tomlinson]] and [[Hinge and Bracket]].<ref name=d261>Douglas, p. 261; and Finch, Hilary, "Happiest returns", ''The Times'', 15 March 1982, p. 7</ref>

She died in London on 16 June 1990 at the age of ninety-eight.<ref name=times/>  A memorial service was held in Westminster Abbey.<ref name=d261/>