Opera in Grand Rapids began on a Tuesday evening, September 15, 1868, in Squier's Opera Hall, where the Grau Opera Company presented Flotow's Martha, complete with orchestra and chorus. The editor of The Eagle wrote, "The evening was an outstanding success, the opera admirably presented to a full, appreciative and delighted audience," and the Grau Company--no less delighted--responded with a matinee encore of Auber's Fra Diavalo. Though neither of these Victorian favorites is much seen these days, opera took root in Grand Rapids, producing results both curious and exciting. Several years later, Professor Jaroslav Zielinski, a Polish emigre temporarily settled here, returned locally produced opera to Grand Rapids. Zielinski, whose excellent musical training and artistic tastes are evident in the reputation he enjoyed while living here, twice directed local amateurs in ambitious undertakings: the future of locally-produced opera looked bright. But Zielinski's decision to go West ended all that.

But it was the Mid-West's own Emma Abbott who sparked the most enthusiasm during her six seasons here. Her Grand Opera Company introduced local audiences to Donizetti's two ill-fated mad women, Lucia di Lammermoor and Linda of Chamounix, as well as Verdi's Violetta, a role she was reluctant to sing because, she feared, "it would glorify fallen women." Miss Abbott starred in most of her Company's productions, but even on her nights off she appeared at intermission to enthrall everyone with her "Last Rose of Summer," "Swanee River," and "Home Sweet Home." She was America's favorite songbird and her Company always packed the Powers Opera House.

In 1916, overflow audiences greeted the Boston Grand Opera Company's La Boheme, starring the Met's own Maggie Teyte. The second half of this curious program featured Anna Pavlova and her Imperial Ballet Russe. An evening of a full-length opera followed by a complete ballet seems strange to modern audiences, but such mixed productions were then not unusual at all. The following year, the Boston Company returned with two Met stars--Maggie Teyte and Riccardo Martin--in a Faust production that was, by all reports, magnificently sung. But a train accident cost the group its final act Walpurgis Night and both its music and ballet had to be abandoned. In addition, the mishap forced the company to use La Boheme sets for the Act III outdoor scenes. All this the audience took in good spirits, and the Grand Rapids Press critic pronounced the Faust "brilliantly presented."

Over the next decades, opera in Grand Rapids fell on hard times. Even the valiant efforts of an impressive list of local sponsors could not rescue opera for Grand Rapids during the twenties and early thirties. Clearly, the effects of motion pictures and the phonograph were being felt everywhere in the entertainment world. And though opera productions were scarce in these years, opera stars were not. Under the auspices of various groups--Mary Free Bed Guild, St. Cecilia Society, East Congregational Church, the Schubert Club--some of the world's most famous opera singers were brought to town including Lauritz Melchior. These glorious recitals packed the various auditoriums around town during the inter-war years.