Milka Ternina

Milka Ternina (née Katarina Milka Trnina, pronounced [katarǐːna mîːlka tř̩nina]; December 19, 1863 – May 18, 1941) was a Croatian dramatic soprano who enjoyed a high reputation in major American and European opera houses. Praised by audiences and music critics alike for the electrifying force of her acting and the excellence of her singing in both German and Italian works, her career was curtailed at its peak in 1906 by a medical condition which paralyzed a nerve in her face.

A native of Vezišće (part of Križ), the young Trnina (usually referred to as Milka Ternina in English-speaking countries) studied singing privately with Ida Winterberg in Zagreb and then with Joseph Gänsbacher at the conservatory in Vienna, graduating from his class in 1883 with a gold medal. She had made her operatic debut while still a student in Zagreb, singing Amelia in an 1882 production of Giuseppe Verdi's Un ballo in maschera.

Ternina sang initially as a full-time professional performer in Leipzig and subsequently took up a position with the resident operatic company in Graz in 1884. She stayed there for two years, acquiring a useful knowledge of stagecraft and manifesting a burning devotion to opera as a serious art form.

The conductor Anton Seidl was impressed by Ternina's potential and he recommended her to replace another acclaimed dramatic soprano, Katharina Klafsky, at the Bremen opera theatre. While in Bremen, she participated in a production of Richard Wagner's Ring Cycle (her first). In 1890, she was engaged by the Munich Royal Opera, where, over the next few years, she consolidated her reputation as a top-class singer and distinguished herself as an outstanding exponent of Wagnerian music dramas. She excelled, too, as Beethoven's Leonore.

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