A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Sterling, Antoinette
STERLING, Antoinette, born Jan. 23, 1850(?) at Sterlingville, in the State of New York, though American by birth and parentage is of English extraction, tracing her descent through William Bradford, one of the Pilgrim Fathers who crossed in 'The Mayflower,' and was the second Governor of Plymouth Colony, from the family of John Bradford, martyr, burnt in 1555.
She possessed, even in childhood, a voice of extraordinary range, which afterwards settled into a contralto of great richness and volume, with a compass from E♭ in the Bass stave to the top F in the Treble one. Her first serious study of singing began in 1867 in New York under Signor Abella, better known as the husband of Mme. d'Angri. She came to England in 1868 and remained a few months, singing chiefly in the provinces, en route for Germany. There she was first a pupil of Mme. Marchesi at Cologne; then of Pauline Viardot at Baden Baden, and lastly of Manuel Garcia in London. She returned to America in 1871, and soon took a high position as a concert singer. On May 13, 1873, she took leave of her native country in a concert at the Irving Hall, Boston, arrived in England, and made her first appearance on Nov. 5 at the Covent Garden Promenade Concert, under the conductorship of Sir Julius Benedict. At the Crystal Palace she first sang on Dec. 6, and shortly after appeared at the Saturday Popular, Feb. 21, 1874, Sacred Harmonic, Philharmonic, Albert Hall and London Ballad Concerts. At Gloucester, in the following September, she sang at the Festival. She was married on Easter Sunday 1875, at the Savoy Chapel, to Mr. John MacKinlay; and since then, excepting a few months in that year, when she sang in America in a series of 40 concerts under Theodore Thomas, has resided in London, and is one of the best known and most popular singers there.
Mme. Sterling is not unknown in classical music. On her first arrival here she sang the Cradle Song from Bach's Christmas Oratorio with much effect, and her répertoire contains songs of Mendelssohn and Schumann. But she is essentially a ballad singer. Her voice is one of great beauty and attractiveness; but it is her earnestness and intention, the force which she throws into the story—especially if it be weird or grim, such as 'The three fishers,' 'The sands of Dee,' or 'The three ravens'—and, probably more than all, the distinctness with which she declaims the words, whether they be German or English, that form the real secret of her success.[ G. ]