Graciela Rivera year she made her operatic debut as Rosina in "The Barber of Seville" by Gioachino Rossini at the New Orleans Opera. In December 1951, she became the first Puerto Rican to sing a lead role at the New York Metropolitan Opera as Lucia in the production of Lucia di Lammermoor. She earned accolades for her performance from critics around the world. In 1953, Rivera was proclaimed "Citizen of the Year" by the City of New York. In 1954 Rivera was featured as a guest singer in Name That Tune, and later that year, at an instance of Your Show of
Gioachino Rossini History of Western Music", "Rossini's fame surpassed that of any previous composer, and so, for a long time, did the popularity of his works. Audiences took to his music as if to an intoxicating drug—or, to put it more decorously, to champagne, with which Rossini's bubbly music was constantly compared." Rossini took existing operatic genres and forms and perfected them in his own style. Through his own work, as well as through that of his followers and imitators, Rossini's style dominated Italian opera throughout the first half of the 19th century. In his compositions, Rossini plagiarized freely from himself, a