Pilar Lorengar

Lorenza Pilar García Seta (January 16, 1928 – June 2, 1996) was a Spanish (Aragonese) soprano who used the professional name Pilar Lorengar. She was best known for her interpretations of opera and the Spanish genre Zarzuela, and as a soprano she was known for her full register, a youthful timbre as well as a distinctive vibrato.

Lorengar was born in the El Gancho district of Zaragoza. At a very young age she participated in a radio program called Ondas Infantiles, organized by Radio Zaragoza; she began formal music lessons at the age of fourteen under Margarita Martínez. She moved to Barcelona to study at the Barcelona Music Conservatory and began performing incognito under the name Loren Arce in various halls in order to pay for her lessons. She studied in Madrid under Spanish lyric soprano Ángeles Otein, and she also studied in West Berlin with Carl Ebert and mezzo-soprano Hertha Klust, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau's teacher.

Lorengar became a member of the chorus of the Teatro de la Zarzuela around 1949. She made her professional debut in 1950 in Oran, Algeria, playing the role of Maruxa. In 1951 she made her Spanish debut in the principal role in the Zarzuela El canastillo de fresas (The Strawberry Basket). In 1952, she performed as a soloist in Barcelona in Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and also in Brahms' Requiem.

Her international opera career started in 1955 at the Festival international d'Art Lyrique in Aix-en-Provence, where she played Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro. She went on to play in London, Glyndebourne and Buenos Aires. In 1958 she signed a contract with the Deutsche Oper Berlin, a relationship that would last for thirty years. Her first performance for the Deutsche Oper took place a few months later, in 1959. In 1963 she was distinguished with the title of Kammersänger by the Senate of Berlin.

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