Soprano Rosalbina Caradori was born in 1800 in Milan. Her father, Baron de Munck, an Alsatian-born colonel in the French army, died young. She adopted her mother’s maiden name. Having toured in France and Germany, she was engaged at King’s Theatre, Haymarket, where she made her first appearance as Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro on 12 January 1822. In 1824, she married Edward Thomas Allan, Secretary of the King’s Theatre. She would appear at the theatre until 1827, the last season of Italian opera in London for some time. She spent the years between 1830 and 1832 singing leading parts in Venice, Milan, and Paris. She then returned to Britain, limiting herself to concerts and oratorio. She had already sung the soprano solo at the first British performance of Beethoven’s Ninth (21 March 1825) and performed in the 1834 Handel Festival in Westminster Abbey. In 1836 she sang with Maria Malibran at Manchester, and in 1846 took part in the first performance of Mendelssohn’s Elijah at Birmingham. She died at Elm Lodge, Surbiton Hill Road, Kingston, in October 1865.
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