t h e r o s a t r o u p e
Joseph O’Mara
Joseph O’Mara was born in Limerick, Ireland, on 16
July 1864. He liked singing, and from his youth sang locally with church
choirs. After a brief ambition for life at sea, he sought a scholarship at
the Royal College of Music in London, but it was unsuccessful as the
application lacked his father’s consent. This was subsequently rectified,
and he was later able to study with Moretti for two years in Milan. On his
return home he was recruited by Rupert D’Oyly Carte’s new Royal English
Opera Company to share the title tenor role with Ben Davies in Ivanhoe,
a new opera by Sir Arthur Sullivan. The opera opened on 31 January 1891 with
O’Mara making his professional debut on 4 February. Both tenor and opera
were successful with the latter achieving over 150 consecutive performances
before D’Oyly Carte’s operatic venture closed in early 1892 and O’Mara moved
to operetta, concert and oratorio.
A year later O’Mara returned to opera with two Carl Rosa performances. He
made his company debut as Turiddu (Cavalleria Rusticana) at the
Royal Court Theatre in Liverpool on 2 March 1893, and followed as Faust on 8
April in Manchester. The Rosa may have contemplated a permanent engagement
but Augustus Harris promptly recruited him and for the next three years he
took part in his English and Italian seasons in London and the provinces.
Early in 1896 Harris offered him a leading role in Shamus O’Brien,
a new opera by the Irish composer Sir Charles Villiers Stanford. The London
première on 2 March 1896 with Henry Wood conducting and O’Mara as the
informer Mike Murphy went well. The provincial performances, although
somewhat overshadowed by the death of Harris in the summer, were similarly
received with O’Mara praised for both singing and acting. American tours
followed but he was back home by the end of the century and the remainder of
his career was mainly in Britain and Ireland.
Joseph O’Mara as Don Jose in Carmen
O’Mara did not neglect the concert platform but from 1902 focused upon
opera: with the Moody Manners company until 1908, then with the Thomas
Beecham company in 1910 after a season in America. However, he managed to
make six Rosa guest appearances in the 1910 Dublin Christmas season singing
in Tannhäuser, Trovatore, and Lily of Killarney.
He was never able to add to this as he was involved with his own company
from 1912 until his retirement. Both the portrait photograph and the
postcard as Don Jose in Carmen date from the early 1900s. They
depict a handsome man with the aura of a matinée idol.
The Rosa performances total only eight, from a renowned tenor with a
repertoire of over sixty operas. There is nothing of his most famous role,
Lohengrin, and Mike Murphy, his signature role, was sung for other
companies. He was one that got away but if the Rosa had signed him in 1893,
I suspect that the career path would have been very different! His recording
legacy is similarly slight. He made only five Gramophone Company recordings,
three in late 1901 and two unpublished in 1911. The recording of Mike
Murphy’s ‘Ochone, when I used to be young’ is historically important as it
was specially written for O’Mara by Stanford. The tenor also introduced
radio to Ireland with a concert on 1 January 1926 but no recordings have
survived. He may have disliked recording but he would undoubtedly have
welcomed the first complete recording of Shamus O’Brien issued by
Retrospect Opera in March 2024.
Joseph O’Mara died at his Dublin home on 5 March 1927 and was laid to rest
in Glasnevin Cemetery three days later.
© 2024 John Ward
