Edna Garabedian Edna Garabedian Edna Garabedian is an American operatic mezzo-soprano, voice teacher, and opera director. Born to Armenian immigrants to the United States in Fresno, California, Garabedian studied singing with William Vennard at the University of Southern California, Lotte Lehmann at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Anna Hamlin in New York City, and Rosa Ponselle in Baltimore. In 1961 she won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. She made her professional opera debut in 1965 as Santuzza in Pietro Mascagni's "Cavalleria rusticana" with the New York City Opera. She went on to sing leading roles with the Baltimore Opera Company,
Cavalleria rusticana an LP, it is available on CD under several historical recording labels. A double-bill performance of "Cavalleria" and "Pagliacci" was transmitted as the first broadcast by New York City's Metropolitan Opera on 11 December 1910. Radio pioneer Lee de Forest talked Giulio Gatti-Casazza, the Met manager, into sending the program over the airwaves by using a backstage radio transmitter and a rooftop antenna, "using a long fishing pole for his mast." Enrico Caruso and Emmy Destinn were in the leading roles. Few listened. There were no radios. But public receivers had been set up in several well-advertised locations in New