Marie Narelle

Marie Narelle (28 January 1870 – 26 January 1941), born Catherine Mary Ryan, was an Australian singer, billed as "the Australian Queen of Irish Song".

Marie Narelle
A white woman, standing, with dark hair in a bouffant updo, wearing a dark gown with bare shoulders, lace sleeves, and a long train.
Marie Narelle, from a 1906 newspaper.
Born
Catherine Mary Ryan

28 January 1870
Combaning station, near Temora, New South Wales
Died26 January 1941
Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, England
NationalityAustralian
Other namesCatherine Mary Callaghan (after first marriage); Catherine Mary Currie (after second marriage)
OccupationSinger

Early life

Catherine Mary Ryan, called "Molly", was born at Combaning station, near Temora, New South Wales, the daughter of John Joseph Ryan and Catherine Mary Comans Ryan. Her father was a goldminer and a rancher.[1] She attended a convent school in Wagga Wagga, with further vocal training later in life, in Sydney.[2]

Career

Left to support three young children as a single parent, Molly Callaghan started teaching music to remote students in Candelo, riding her horse between lessons. She soon had a music studio in Sydney, and began performing under the stage name "Marie Narelle",[3] and billed as "the Australian Queen of Irish Song."[2]

As Marie Narelle, she gave concerts of Irish and Scottish ballads, arias, and other popular works. She was invited to Ireland to perform in 1902, and took the opportunity to study Gaelic. She performed at a benefit concert in London's Royal Albert Hall in 1902,[1] sharing the bill with Clara Butt and Ada Crossley.[2]

During the 1904–1905 season, she sang in New York,[4] was part of the Irish delegation at the St. Louis World's Fair,[5] and made recordings for Edison.[6] She toured New Zealand in 1906,[7] toured the United States in 1917,[8] and was heard on Australian stages again in 1909 and in 1925–1926.[2][9] She gave a concert at Carnegie Hall with both of her daughters in 1921, a fundraiser for the Woman's Hospital Alumnae Sick Benefit Fund.[10]

Narelle was based in New York City after 1910, and in England after her second husband's death in 1934.[2]

Personal life

Catherine Mary Ryan married Matthew Aloysius Callaghan in 1891, in Sydney. They had three children together, Reginald, Kathleen, and Rita, before they separated in 1894. The Callaghans divorced in 1909. She married again, to engineer Harry Allan Currie, in New York City in 1911. She was widowed when Currie died in 1934, and she died in 1941, in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, England, aged 70 years.[2][5]

Narelle's younger cousin Eva Mylott was also known as a singer in Australia and abroad. They sometimes toured and performed together. Mylott is remembered today as the grandmother of actor Mel Gibson.[11]

References
  1. "Marie Narelle Dead". The Gazette. 29 January 1941. p. 9. Retrieved 7 May 2020 – via Newspapers.com.
  2. Walsh, G. P., "Narelle, Marie (Molly) (1870–1941)", Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, retrieved 7 May 2020
  3. Woollacott, Angela (2001). To Try Her Fortune in London: Australian Women, Colonialism, and Modernity. Oxford University Press. p. 76. ISBN 978-0-19-514268-6.
  4. "Round About the Town". Musical Courier. 50: 31. 10 May 1905.
  5. "Mme. Marie Narelle Dies; Sang at World's Fair Here". St. Louis Post-Dispatch. 29 January 1941. p. 17. Retrieved 7 May 2020 – via Newspapers.com.
  6. University of California, Santa Barbara Library Department of Special Collections (16 November 2005). "Marie Narelle recordings". Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project. Retrieved 7 May 2020.
  7. "Miss Marie Narelle". Wairarapa Age. 12 December 1906. p. 5. Retrieved 7 May 2020 – via Papers Past.
  8. "American Tour for Marie Narelle". Musical Courier. 75: 7. 9 August 1917.
  9. "Miss Marie Narelle". The Sydney Morning Herald. 22 October 1925. p. 13. Retrieved 7 May 2020 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. "Give Benefit Concert". Musical America. 34: 25. 30 April 1921.
  11. mdhsociety (2 November 2016). "Moruya's Got Talent: Posey, Maud, Eva and Molly". MORUYA and District Historical Society. Retrieved 7 May 2020.
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