Odette Le Fontenay


Odette Le Fontenay, born Odette Le Flaguais, was a French soprano opera singer and music educator based in the United States after 1913. She sang with the Metropolitan Opera in its 1916-1917 season.

Early life and education

Odette Le Flaguais was born in Paris and raised in London, the daughter of Louis Adrien Georges Le Flaguais and Félicie McDougald Bouligny. Her parents divorced in 1895. Her mother was from New Orleans, Louisiana, a descendant of Spanish Louisiana governor Francisco Bouligny. Odette's great-grandfather was congressman John Edward Bouligny. She studied in Italy and Spain, in her youth.

Career

Le Fontenay began her career at Covent Garden in London, and with the Opéra-Comique in Paris, before moving to the United States. In 1914 she sang as a soloist with the John Philip Sousa band. In 1916 she sang in a "suffrage operetta" called Melinda and her Sisters, with Frances Alda, Emmy Wehlen, Marie Dressler, Marie Doro, and other performers at the Waldorf Astoria's grand ballroom. In the 1916-1917 season, she sang with the Metropolitan Opera in New York, debuting in the same season as soprano Marie Sundelius. She had roles in The Magic Flute, The Marriage of Figaro, and Hansel and Gretel.
She toured across the United States giving concerts and recitals after her season with the Metropolitan Opera. A 1921 reviewer said that Le Fontenay gave a "rather unusual and altogether interesting" program, and that she "displayed a voice of presentable quality and serviceable vocal equipment". She made recordings for the Edison Records and Victor companies, and even performed "duets" with recordings of her own voice in concerts, as demonstration of Edison's "re-creation" technology.
Later in the 1920s, Le Fontenay also sang on radio programs, sometimes sharing a program with her husband. After a divorce, she taught voice at the Ethel Walker School in Simsbury, Connecticut from 1935 to 1943.

Personal life

In 1914, Odette Le Fontenay married fellow opera singer Philippe Gustave Coudert, a baritone, in New York. They had three childen and divorced in 1932. She died in 1965, aged 80 years, in Florida.