Obituary : Anna Pollak

When Anna Pollak made her debut in 1945 with Sadler's Wells Opera at the Prince's Theatre, London, as Dorabella in Cosi fan tutte, it was the first time that the English mezzo- soprano had appeared in opera. She already had, however, considerable stage experience as an actress in repertory, and as a singer in musical comedy, revue and pantomime. An audition with Joan Cross, then managing the Sadler's Wells company, led to Pollak's engagement - an engagement that lasted for 17 years.

Because of her tall, slim figure, Pollak was frequently cast in trouser roles, singing Cherubino, Hansel, Siebel in Faust and Prince Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus with great success: but she was a fine if unconventional Carmen, while one of her most memorable portrayals was the Secretary in Menotti's The Consul. She also sang with the English Opera Group (EOG), creating Bianca in Britten's The Rape of Lucretia, and several other roles.

Pollak was born in Manchester in 1912 of Austrian parentage. She spent her childhood in Holland and, after finishing her education in Manchester, became an actress. During the Second World War she worked in ARP and also sang in concerts for Ensa. When Sadler's Wells Theatre re-opened a month after VE Day, Pollak had recently joined the company. Her only formal musical education was the encouragement she received from Joan Cross and from the conductor Lawrence Collingwood. Her roles during her first season included Ludmilla in The Bartered Bride, Mrs Ford in Vaughan Williams' Sir John in Love, the Sandman in Hansel and Gretel and Kate Pinkerton in Madam Butterfly.

In July 1946, Pollak sang Bianca, Lucretia's old nurse, in the premiere of The Rape of Lucretia with the EOG at Glyndebourne. Returning to Sadler's Wells for her second season, she was promoted from Kate Pinkerton to Suzuki, and added Cherubino, Lola (Cavalleria rusticana) and Maddalena (Rigoletto) to her growing repertory, which soon embraced a very wide variety of roles. She sang Carmen in Tyrone Guthrie's vivid production of Bizet's opera in 1949: though neither vocally nor dramatically the traditional Carmen, she sang the music extremely well, while her gypsy was acted with great spirit and dignity.

Pollak repeated her Dorabella at Glyndebourne in 1952, the first time that she had sung in Italian. The same year she made her Covent Garden debut as a very mischievous Cherubino. Meanwhile at Sadler's Wells she sang Meg in Falstaff, and the Sorceress in Vaughan Williams' Hugh the Drover. One of her most delightful comic roles was Margarita in Wolf-Ferrari's I quattro rusteghi, or rather Mrs Crusty in The School for Fathers, as it became in Edward Dent's highly amusing translation, which moved the action from Venice to London. In 1953 she sang Lady Capulet in the British premiere of Heinrich Sutermeister's Romeo and Juliet, and the following year created the part of Lady Nelson in Lennox Berkeley's Nelson.

In November 1954 Sadler's Wells mounted a successful production of The Consul (the first by a British company), in which Pollak sang the Secretary, the super-efficient but not entirely unsympathetic mouthpiece for the absent (possibly non-existent) Consul. Other new roles included Nancy in Martha and Mary in The Flying Dutchman, in which she was "a tower of strength". Pollak created the title role in another opera by Berkeley, Ruth, which was premiered by the EOG at the Scala Theatre in 1956, and at the Wells the following year created Mrs Strickland in John Gardner's The Moon and Sixpence, an adaptation of Somerset Maugham's novel, based on the life of the painter Gauguin.

Pollak also took part in several operettas, where her superb diction, both in dialogue and in song, was of particular value. Calliope in Orpheus in the Underworld and the Swedish Baroness in La Vie parisienne were both excellent portrayals, but her "superbly bored and elegant" Prince Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus was among her very finest characterisations. In 1961 she made a comic yet terrifying Witch in Hansel and Gretel (her third role in the opera, after the Sandman and Hansel) for BBC Television.

After leaving Sadler's Wells in 1962 Pollak continued to appear with the EOG and other groups. She sang Miss Baggott, the Housekeeper in Britten's Let's Make an Opera, with the Finchley Children's Opera Group; Mrs Peachum in Britten's version of The Beggar's Opera for EOG at Aldeburgh, Paris and Edinburgh; she created several roles in Malcolm Williamson's English Eccentrics, adapted from Edith Sitwell's book of biographical studies, at Aldeburgh in 1964; and Nora in the same composer's Julius Caesar Jones for Finchley COG at the Jeanetta Cochrane Theatre in 1966. That year she returned to Sadler's Wells to give a hallucinatory performance of the old Countess in The Queen of Spades.

Her last appearance with the company was at the Coliseum in 1968, when she sang Public Opinion (as Calliope had become in a new translation) in Orpheus in the Underworld. Then she retired.

Elizabeth Forbes

Anna Pollak, mezzo-soprano: born Manchester 1 May 1912; died Hythe, Kent 28 November 1996.