Coretti Arle-Titz

Coretti Arle-Titz (December 5, 1883 – December 14, 1951) was an American-born jazz, spiritual and pop music singer, dancer, and actress in the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union.

Early life

Coretté Elisabeth Hardy was born on December 5, 1883, in Churchville, New York, to Carrie Carter and Thomas J. Hardy. Thomas migrated north to Brooklyn around 1875 from Petersburg, Virginia. During the summer of 1879, he met and soon married Carrie Carter (another migrant from Richmond, Virginia).

In April 1880, while employed as a servant for the Walach family (a German family living on Long Island), Carrie bore him a son. Unfortunately, the child did not survive and the couple traveled north to the township of Churchville, where Carrie bore two children, Coretté (1881) and Anna (b. 1884).

Sometime between 1886 and 1888, the family returned to Manhattan, where eight more children were produced, although Edward (b. 1889), Isabella Clara (b. 1892), Miles (b. 1895) were the only ones to survive childhood. The family resided at 140 West 19th Street in the busy Midtown district.

In early 1900, the family relocated to 448 West 54th Street in the heavily industrialized Hell's Kitchen district. Every tenement building and shantytown was filled with Irish immigrants who had fled from Ireland's Great Famine to seek employment on the Hudson River docks or the railroads. Many of those unfortunate enough to reside in this congested poverty-infested neighborhood turned to gang life. By April 1900, 18-year-old Coretté Hardy found employment as a copyist (transcribing documents) and used the Mt. Olivet Baptist Church Choir as her only musical outlet.

Career

Early career (1901–1907)

In April 1901, Coretté noticed an advertisement in the New York Herald posted by German theatrical impresario, Paula Kohn-Wöllner, seeking seven African-American women with the ability to sing and dance for a concert tour of Germany. Hardy replied to the advert and was promptly accepted. Kohn-Wöllner, who had previously managed two theatrical troupes in the 1890s in Leipzig and Chemnitz, had made a trip to New York to visit her two married sisters, when she got the idea to organize a Negro theatrical troupe to tour across Europe. Soon the troupe consisted of Ollie Burgoyne (a 26-year-old singer from the Oriental America show), Fannie Wise (a 19-year-old singer from Brooklyn), Florence Collins (a 26-year-old pianist from Kentucky), Alverta Burley (a 19-year-old from Baltimore), S.T. Jubrey (a 32-year-old housewife from Virginia) and Emma Harris (29-year old housekeeper from Brooklyn). Unfortunately, 19-year-old Coretté Hardy, although accepted, was to be left behind as a replacement in case any of the other women decided to quit the newly christened "Louisiana Amazon Guard" troupe. On April 10, the six women were brought to the Passport Office to apply for their first passports. After two weeks with Ms. Kohn-Wöllner paying for all six of the women's travel expenses, they boarded on the S.S. Deutschland, heading for Germany.

On April 28, 1902, Coretté received her first passport and around late May, accompanied by Fannie Smith (from Philadelphia) traveled across the Atlantic to join the Louisiana Amazon Guard troupe in Europe. While traveling abroad, she changed her name to Coretté Alefred, for unknown reasons. For five successful months, the troupe traveled across central Europe, performing in Zurich, St. Gallen, Munich, Leipzig and Dresden. On November 1, 1902, during an engagement in Dresden, the women severed relations with their German impresario and sued her for financial exploitation and mismanagement. Ollie Burgoyne was elected as the troupe manager. On November 16, now as the "Five Louisianas", the troupe relocated to Berlin, where they began a short German tour for the next four months. In March 1903, during another Dresden appearance, Ollie Burgoyne and Florence Collins renewed their passports and departed for London to join the cast of Hurtig & Seamon's "In Dahomey", which opened the following month at the Shaftesbury Theatre. Possibly under the management of Emma Harris, the troupe continued touring Germany for another three months before departing for the Russian Empire. After receiving a passport from Berlin's American Embassy (July 10, 1903), the troupe traveled northwest to Saint Petersburg, to appear for two months at the popular Krestovskiy Garden Amusement Park, where they opened on July 19. On September 29, the troupe opened in Moscow at Aumont's French Theater for another two months billed as the "4 Ebony Belles". During the winter of 1903, the Louisiana Amazon Guard (Ebony Belles) finally dissolved. Alverta Burley married African-American entertainer Oliver E. Brodie and the couple toured as "Brodie & Brodie". Harris convinced Coretté Hardy and Fannie Smith to remain in Russia with her and they formed the "Harris Trio". For the next six months, the trio performed between Saint-Petersburg and Moscow. In March 1904, the duo became the "Harris Trio" with the addition of Fannie Smith, and together they departed for Helsinki with an engagement at the illustrious Hotell Fennia, where Finnish high society enjoyed mingling.

Around May 1904, the Harris Trio, together with Ollie Bourgoyne and Jennie Scheper (from the Florida Creole Girls) formed a new company known as the "Creole Crackerjacks Troupe" (or the Creole Belles) and continued touring the principal Russian cities. On January 22, 1905, while attending a party, hosted by popular American jockey, William Caton, in central Saint-Petersburg, the women witnessed the Bloody Sunday riots outside the Tsar's palace and across the city. After nine months, the troupe dissolved and Coretté, Emma, and Fannie immediately returned to Moscow, where they resumed working at the Aumont Theater for a few weeks. The trio dissolved in February, Emma becoming a solo artist and Coretté and Fannie forming the "Koretty & the Creole Girl" song-and-dance duo. For the next 13 months, Coretté and Fannie toured St. Petersburg, Moscow and Warsaw.

From 1906 to 1907, during the height of the 1905 Revolution, there's no record of the two women. Most likely they continued performing across the Russian Empire. On September 25, 1907, Coretté resurfaced in Moscow, applying for a new passport. By this point, Fannie Smith was in Saint-Petersburg, with her new lover and dance partner, Robert Ledbetter (the couple would return to Philadelphia in September 1914).

K. G. Utina (1908–1916)

In late 1907 or early 1908, after a five-month engagement, 26-year-old Coretté married a nobleman named Utin and moved into his home in central Saint-Petersburg. It is currently unknown which member of the Utin household Corette, although it has been narrowed down between the wealthy prosecutor and senator, Sergey Yakovlevich Utin or his cousins, Vladimir Lvovich Utin (a lawyer) or Alexei Lvovich Utin. The Utin family, originally successful Jewish merchants, after converting to the Eastern Orthodox Church in the 1850s, became an extremely wealthy bunch of bankers, business tycoons (Baku Oil Company), lawyers, and politicians that owned (or built) an abundance of property in the Russian capital. At the elaborate dinners organized in the numerous family homes and estates, members of government, businessmen, writers, and scientists were frequent guests. Everyone in the family was exceptionally educated, ambitious, and surprisingly radical in their thinking. The family had taken part in the 1861 student movement and the Decembrist Revolution. Despite Russia's national anti-Semitic attitudes, the family never forgot their Jewish heritage and maintained positive relations with Russian Jews. From the beginning, the marriage was marred by jealousy from her in-laws who felt that her husband had married beneath him. He was accused of renouncing his family as an African-American cabaret artist.

Immediately after the wedding, she Russified her name as Koretti Genrichovna de Utina (Russian: Коретти Генриховна де-Утина) and possibly even petitioned St. Petersburg's Ministry of the Interior to receive Russian citizenship, as she suddenly stopped bothering to renew her passport and the American Embassy no longer kept any records of her. Coretti returned to the stage as M-lle К. Г. Утина (Mademoiselle K. G. Utina). Performing Russian Romance songs with her dramatic soprano voice, she was sometimes also billed as the Indian Nightingale or the Beautiful Creole.

From 1908 to 1909, she appeared at the New Summer Garden Theater, a wooden theater located on 58 Bassenaya (now 58 Nekrasov) that staged operas and operettas. In August 1908, she appeared in Franz von Suppè's operetta ''Boccaccio (operetta)'' in the minor role of Sisti, a servant (August 31, 1908). The following year, she had another minor role in ''Letim'', a three-act Italian operetta (July 16–31, 1909). Her performances were sparse between 1908 and 1910, as she bore two children with her husband.

In October 1910, after the New Summer Garden Theater was destroyed by a fire, Coretti returned to New York after eight years abroad and visited her family at 218 West 64th Street. She found the family had fallen upon hard times and relocated to the dangerous San Juan Hill district. Her father was laboring as an elevated railway porter, her mother still scrubbing floors for the white families, and her brother Edward selling newspapers on every street corner across San Juan Hill. Young Clara and Miles were still attending the nearby school. Although the family was happy to reunite with Coretti, the joy quickly dissolved whenever the subject of her recent marriage came up. Her parents were not pleased, nor did they accept their daughter's marriage.

Soon newspapers began reporting about the musical appearances of "Coretta de Outine of Saint-Petersburg". An acquaintance of Coretti's, Richetta G. Randolph helped to arrange her appearances in hotels, clubs, churches and other social functions around the city. On October 27, Coretti appeared in the musical cantata ''Jephthah and his Daughter'', held at the Mt. Olivet Debating Club. After the performance, Toastmaster Allison presented Coretti with a gold pin as a token of appreciation for her performance. The following month, on November 28, at the Jubilee Quartette Reception held at the Hotel Maceo, Coretti performed "Do not say that the grave ends all". Eventually, the tour came to a halt as Coretti could no longer stand America's prejudiced attitudes, especially since she had become so accustomed to being able to frequent any restaurant or public space that she wanted in Europe. On December 5, Ms. Randolph threw Coretti a large birthday/going away party at her apartment at 248 West 53rd Street before she boarded a ship five days later back home to Russia.

Back home, while her husband was away, Coretti sent the children away to relatives in Moscow and embarked upon her first solo tour across the Russian Empire. In May 1911, she appeared at Saint-Petersburg's Jardin d'Hiver Theater (previously known as the Apollo Theater), located at Fontanka Embankment 13. Two months later in July, she was in Kiev at the Apollo Garden Theatre. Located at 8 Meringovskaya St, a three-story stone building, known as the Noble Club, housed the Apollo restaurant with its open-air stage that showcased variety, opera and theatrical productions daily. The following month, she arrived just outside the Latvian capital of Riga in the seaside resort town of Jūrmala. The town, with its wooden art nouveau villas, sanatoriums and long sandy beaches was already a popular tourist destination. In the Edinburgh neighborhood (now Dzintari), the Rigasche Rundschau newspapers advertised her debut at the Edinburger Sea Pavilion on August 10. Rigasche Rundschau:

"Mlle Outina, the Indian Nightingale. The fact that a Black woman is a Russian Romance singer, you've probably never heard of such, and yet she behaves as so. Originating from the United States, Fraulein Outina came to Russia, where she was the main attraction in the south (Ukraine), Moscow, and St. Petersburg, and was received enthusiastically everywhere. Here, too, she had great applause yesterday upon completing her first song, because she has good qualities and a beauty for her race. It was pleasant to say that her manner and costume were free from any theatrical gimmicks and completely natural and discrete. Furthermore, the directors succeeded in accordance with general wishes to extend her stay for another five days."

From January 14–24, 1912, Coretti was in Kharkov performing at V. Jatkin's scandalous Villa Jatkina cabaret, located on the Kharkov embankment along the Kharkiv

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