Betty Fabila Herrerías (28 May 1929 – 7 August 2012) was a Mexican soprano opera singer and biologist.
Born in Mexico City, she studied at Mexico's
National Conservatory of Music and the National School of Music at the
National Autonomous University of Mexico
The National Autonomous University of Mexico (, UNAM) is a public university, public research university in Mexico. It has several campuses in Mexico City, and many others in various locations across Mexico, as well as a presence in nine countri ...
under the
baritone
A baritone is a type of classical music, classical male singing human voice, voice whose vocal range lies between the bass (voice type), bass and the tenor voice type, voice-types. It is the most common male voice. The term originates from the ...
David Silva. In 1950, she made her operatic debut as Musetta in ''
La bohème
''La bohème'' ( , ) is an opera in four acts,Puccini called the divisions '':wikt:quadro, quadri'', ''wikt:tableau, tableaux'' or "images", rather than ''atti'' (acts). composed by Giacomo Puccini between 1893 and 1895 to an Italian libretto b ...
'' at the
Palacio de Bellas Artes
The Palacio de Bellas Artes (Palace of Fine Arts) is a prominent cultural center in Mexico City. It hosts performing arts events, literature events and plastic arts galleries and exhibitions (including important permanent Mexican murals). "Bella ...
in Mexico City and went on to sing leading roles there in operas including ''
La traviata'', ''
Madama Butterfly
''Madama Butterfly'' (; ''Madame Butterfly'') is an opera in three acts (originally two) by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa.
It is based on the short story " Madame Butterfly" (1898) by John Lu ...
'', ''
L'amico Fritz
''L'amico Fritz'' () is an opera in three acts by Pietro Mascagni, premiered in 1891 to a libretto by P. Suardon ( Nicola Daspuro) (with additions by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti), based on the 1864 French novel ' by Émile Erckmann and Alexandr ...
'', ''
Faust
Faust ( , ) is the protagonist of a classic German folklore, German legend based on the historical Johann Georg Faust (). The erudite Faust is highly successful yet dissatisfied with his life, which leads him to make a deal with the Devil at a ...
'', ''
Carmen
''Carmen'' () is an opera in four acts by the French composer Georges Bizet. The libretto was written by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée. The opera was first performed by the O ...
'', ''
La serva padrona
''La serva padrona'' (''The Maid Turned Mistress'') is a 1733 intermezzo by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710–1736) to a libretto by Gennaro Federico, after the Play (theatre), play by Jacopo Angello Nelli. It is some 40 minutes long, in two par ...
'', ''
Il segreto di Susanna
''Il segreto di Susanna'' (English: ''Susanna's Secret'', German: ''Susannens Geheimnis'') is an intermezzo in one act by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari to an Italian libretto by Enrico Golisciani. The opera premiered in 1909 and is the most frequently per ...
'', ''
Werther
''Werther'' is an opera (''drame lyrique'') in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet and Georges Hartmann (who used the pseudonym Henri Grémont). It is loosely based on Goethe's epistolary novel ''The S ...
'', and ''
Don Giovanni
''Don Giovanni'' (; K. 527; full title: , literally ''The Rake Punished, or Don Giovanni'') is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. Its subject is a centuries-old Spanish legen ...
''
With her husband, the Italian conductor and musicologist
Uberto Zanolli
Uberto Zanolli (1917–1994), the son of Amelia Pìa Balugani Vecchi and Luigi Zanolli Marcolini, was an Italo-Mexican composer, conductor and writer. An engineer official for the Italian army during World War II, he was a prisoner in Nazi con ...
, she also developed programs for Mexican television. She later became a biologist and ethnologist and taught at the
Escuela Nacional Preparatoria
The Escuela Nacional Preparatoria () (ENP), the oldest senior High School system in Mexico, belonging to the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), opened its doors on February 1, 1868. It was founded by Gabino Barreda, M.D., following ...
where she was a founding member of the school's
chamber orchestra
Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music ...
and its served as its soprano soloist from 1972 to 1994.
In 1962, at the Castle of
Chapultepec
Chapultepec, more commonly called the "Bosque de Chapultepec" (Chapultepec Forest) in Mexico City, is one of the largest Nature Value Area´s in Mexico, measuring in total just over . Centered on a rock formation called Chapultepec Hill, one of ...
in Mexico City, Fabila gave the first modern performances of solo cantatas by the Italian
baroque
The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western Style (visual arts), style of Baroque architecture, architecture, Baroque music, music, Baroque dance, dance, Baroque painting, painting, Baroque sculpture, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from ...
composer
Giacomo Facco
Giacomo Facco (4 February 1676 – 16 February 1753) was an Italian Baroque violinist, Conducting, conductor and composer. One of the most famous Italian composers of his day, he was completely forgotten until 1962, when his work was discovered by ...
, whose scores had been discovered by her husband in the National Library of Paris.
Zanolli and Fabila's daughter,
Betty Zanolli Fabila, is a classical pianist and music teacher. Fabila died on 7 August 2012 at the age of 83.
References
Sources
*Díaz Du-Pond, Carlos
''La ópera en México de 1924 a 1984: testimonio operístico'' Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1986
External links
Betty Fabila's blog
1929 births
2012 deaths
Mexican operatic sopranos
Singers from Mexico City
20th-century Mexican women opera singers
{{Mexico-singer-stub