Alice Tully

Alice Tully
Alice Tully (right), and her sister, Marion Tully.
Born	Alice Bigelow Tully (1902-09-14)September 14, 1902 Corning, New York, U.S.
Died	December 10, 1993(1993-12-10) (aged 91) New York, U.S.
Occupation	Singer, Music Promoter, Philanthropist
Awards	National Medal of Arts (1985)

Alice Bigelow Tully (September 14, 1902 – December 10, 1993) was an American singer of opera and recital, music promoter, patron of the arts and philanthropist from New York. She was a second cousin of the American actress Katharine Hepburn.

Alice Tully was born in Corning, Steuben County, New York, the daughter of lawyer and State Senator William J. Tully (1870–1930) and Clara Mabel (Houghton) Tully (1870–1958) and had one younger sister Marion Gordon (Tully) Dimick (died Washington, 1981). She spent her high school years at the Westover School in Middlebury, Connecticut. Tully began her career as a mezzo-soprano, then became a soprano. She studied in Paris and made her debut in 1927 with the Pasdeloup Orchestra. In 1933, she appeared in Cavalleria rusticana in New York City.

Upon her mother's death in 1958, Tully inherited the estate of her grandfather, Amory Houghton Jr. (1837-1909), (son of Amory Houghton, Sr., founder of the Corning Glass Works), who on June 19, 1860, married Tully's grandmother Ellen Ann Bigelow (daughter of Alanson Bigelow and his Bigelow first cousin, once removed, Anne Rebecca Bangs.) During the rest of her life, Tully donated much of her income to arts institutions, often anonymously. Her cousin, Arthur Amory Houghton, Jr., one of the founders of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, suggested that she give money for a chamber music hall, and in 1963 John D. Rockefeller III convinced her to allow it to be named Alice Tully Hall.