The young singer's talent was so evident that, after less than a year with Marchesi, the impresario Maurice Strakosch gave her a ten-year contract at 1000 francs annually. After she had signed, she received a far better offer of 3000 francs per month from the Théâtre de la Monnaie, Brussels, but Strakosch would not release her and obtained an injunction preventing her from accepting it. She was in despair when the matter was resolved by Strakosch's sudden death. She made her operatic debut four days later as Gilda in "Rigoletto" at La Monnaie on 12 October 1887. The critic Herman Klein described her Gilda as "an instant triumph of the most emphatic kind ... followed ... a few nights later with an equal success as Violetta in "La traviata"." It was at this time, on Marchesi's advice, that she adopted the stage name of "Melba", a contraction of the name of her home city.