Kiri Te Kanawa, Malvina Major, Donald McIntyre

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa (Ngāti Maniapoto) ‍

Born in Gisborne to parents of Māori and European heritage, by the time she was 20 Dame Kiri Te Kanawa had won all the major singing prizes across Australasia, including the Mobil Song Contest, and the Melbourne Sun Aria competition. She was awarded a bursary to study at the London Opera Studio and moved to London in 1965.

In 1971, Dame Kiri made her US debut at the Santa Fe Opera with her performance as Countess Almaviva in Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro. It was a sensation. That same year she made her debut at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, firstly as a Flowermaiden in Wagner’s Parsifal, and then as the Countess in the Marriage of Figaro. Dame Kiri quickly became one of the most famous sopranos in the world.  

Her debut as Desdemona at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1974 was unexpected. The original soprano contracted the flu and Kiri stepped up two weeks early, with no rehearsals, to perform. That performance was broadcast live on radio across America.

Dame Kiri’s repertoire grew to 18 leading roles, including Arabella, Marschallin, the Countess in Capriccio, Fiordiligi, Donna Elvira, Palmina, Countess Almaviva, Violetta, Amelia Boccanegra, Desdemona, Tosca, Mimi, Manon Lescaut, Rosalinde, Tatiana, Micaela and Carmen, Marguerite, and Vanessa. She has performed in all the leading opera houses across the world.

In 1981, her performance as soloist at the wedding of the then Prince and Princess of Wales reached a global television audience of over 600 million people.

The first New Zealand artist awarded a Gold Record in 1967, Dame Kiri has recorded extensively across a range of genres from opera to popular song books and musical theatre, topping the charts and winning a Grammy Award in 1984 for Le nozze di Figaro.

Dame Kiri was appointed a Dame Commander of the British Empire in 1982, awarded the Order of Australia in 1990, and the Order of New Zealand in 1995, all for services to opera. Dame Kiri was appointed a Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour in 2018.

In 2004, she launched the Kiri Te Kanawa Foundation, to assist outstanding young opera singers and musicians through mentoring, and financial support. This has enabled young performers to attend international opera schools and advance their careers.

Dame Kiri appeared in the popular television programme Downton Abbey in 2013 playing Dame Nellie Melba, and officially retired from public concerts in 2017.

“I have always been a proud New Zealander and after five decades of forging a successful international singing career I returned home to enjoy my life and everything this wonderful country has to offer. I’m living in the most beautiful area by the sea”.

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Dame Malvina Major

Malvina Major’s career started off somewhat intertwined with Kiri Te Kanawa’s. Born in Hamilton, Malvina also learned to sing from Sister Mary Leo, travelling up to Auckland each week. She won the 1963 Mobil Song Quest, with Kiri Te Kanawa placing second that year. She also won the Melbourne Sun Aria competition in 1965, the same year she married Winston Fleming. They travelled to London, where she won the Kathleen Ferrier award in 1966, while studying at the London Opera Centre.

The stress of performing all around the world, and the desire to preserve and grow their family saw Malvina and Winston return to New Zealand in 1969, and she went from glamorous gowns to gumboots and early-morning milking. Their children Andrew, Alethea, and Lorraine grew up on the farm. She returned to the stage in the 1980s to great success, but Winston died suddenly on the farm in 1990, which was a huge shock to the family.

Her career spanned 28 major roles, from Cio Cio San in Madama Butterfly to Violetta in La Traviata, and the Countess in the Marriage of Figaro, along with an extensive oratorio and concert repertoire, and a discography of commercial recordings.

In 1991, she established the Dame Malvina Major Foundation to help talented young artists achieve their potential in performing arts, through grants, prizes, and scholarships. That same year she was invested as a Dame Commander of the British Empire.

In 2008, she was made a Principal Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, changed in 2009 to Dame Grand Companion (GNZM), and in 2012 was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit (ONZ).

Malvina retired from professional singing in 2015, after 50 years performing, and continues to teach and support young performers through her Foundation.

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Sir Donald McIntyre‍

Initially trained as a teacher, Auckland-born bass baritone Donald McIntyre travelled to London in 1958 to study at the Guildhall School of Music, and never looked back. He debuted with the Welsh National Opera in 1959 as Zaccaria in Verdi’s Nabucco, and shortly afterwards joined Sadler’s Wells Opera, where he stayed until 1967. It was there that he met conductor John Matheson, who pointed him in the direction of Wagnerian Opera, where he found his home.

Donald made his debut at Bayreuth in 1967 as Telramund in Lohengrin, and he became known as the first British opera singer to sing the role of Wotan in a complete cycle of Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen operas at the Bayreuth Festival. He repeated this feat at Covent Garden in 1974 and debuted at the Metropolitan Opera in 1975 as Wotan.

His appearance in 1976 at Bayreuth, celebrating the centenary of the festival and the first performance of the complete cycle, was conducted by Pierre Boulez. It was the first Ring to be made available on home video and garnered an international audience. He won a Grammy award in 1983 for Best Opera Recording for his performance of Wotan in Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen, with the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra. Donald continued to sing at Bayreuth until 1990, ending with 150 performances to his credit.

He also appeared at all the major opera houses of the world, including the Vienna State Opera, La Scala in Milan, and the Sydney Opera House.

Donald was appointed an OBE in 1977 and promoted to CBE in 1985. He was then appointed a Knight Bachelor for services to opera in 1992, and released a memoir The Only Way Is Up in 2019, covering his 50-year career in opera.