~The "Glass Shatterers!" series focuses on sopranos who sustain High F, or sing higher.
THE SONGBIRD: The soprano Maria Remola (1930 - 2021) is known to coloratura insiders and "high note freaks" because of her astounding survey of stratospheric notes. It is easy to think of Remola as Cuban, but she was actually born in Barcelona and moved to Cuba in 1952. Her professional debut came in Havana in "Dona Francisquita." She became a local star, but toured to Japan and Europe. It has been said by the daughter or Remola's accompanist that she would sing Lucia's mad scene in the higher key and her cadenza included trills up the scale from High D6 to High D7, and that she would sing the famous staccato figures in "Der Hölle Rache" an octave higher than written, so High F7s!? (No recordings exist of these dubious feats.) You can find more info on her career, her politics, and these firsthand accounts on the Diva Legacy site in the miscellaneous section of singer appreciations: divalegacy.com
THE MUSIC: Adolphe Adam's "Le toréador" is an opera-comique that premiered 1849. The character Coraline is an opera singer and she sings these famous variations on a theme of an old French children's folk song "Ah, vous dirai-je, maman" (known in English as the melody of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star"). This tune has been referenced in over a dozen classical works by composers including Haydn, Liszt, Saint-Saens, Montsalvatge, John Corigliano, and most famously in variations set by Mozart for piano (K.265). Whereas Adam's aria is most often heard as a free-standing concert showpiece with soprano and flute interplay -- and a long cadenza -- in the context of his opera here, it is actually a performed as trio.