Lisa della Casa, one of the loveliest singers ever to grace the operatic stage, was born in Burgdorf near Berne in February 1919. Casa was 15 when she began vocal studies with Margarete Haeser in Zurich. In 1941 Casa made her debut as Butterfly in Solothurn-Biel and was later engaged by the Stadttheater in Zurich, remaining there for a number of years. Her other roles have included Gilda ('Rigoletto'), Cleopatra (Handel's 'Giulio Cesare'), Antonia ('Hoffman'), Nedda ('Pagliacci'), both Donna Anna and Donna Elvira ('Don Giovanni'), Marguerite (Berlioz's 'Damnation of Faust'), Pamina ('Die Zauberflote)and even Serena('Porgy and Bess'). She also mastered a number of Richard Strauss roles including Annina an Sophie ('Der Rosenkavalier'),Zdenka ('Arabella')as well as the title role in 'Ariadne auf Naxos'. Della Casa retired from the stage in 1974 when her daughter became very ill. Lisa della Casa's recording of Richard Strauss''Four Last Songs', made in 1953 by Decca, was the first commercial performance made available to the public. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.