Barbara Conrad

Barbara Smith Conrad (August 11, 1937 – May 22, 2017) was an American mezzo-soprano and educator whose operatic career spanned major international stages and whose Broadway credits include the 1966 production of Yerma. Born Barbara Louise Smith in Center Point near Pittsburg, Texas, she was the youngest of five children and developed an early interest in music through performances with her siblings at their Baptist church. She later relocated to Atlanta, Texas before pursuing her studies.

Conrad entered the University of Texas at Austin in 1956 as part of the first class of African-American undergraduates. The following year, she was cast as Dido, Queen of Carthage, in a student production of Dido and Aeneas. Concern within the student body over her romantic pairing in the role with a white performer prompted Joseph Norwin Chapman of the Texas Legislature to pressure the university's president to intervene, and Conrad was removed from the part two weeks before the opera's scheduled opening. Local and student media, along with eight other Texas legislators, protested the decision, and the story was reported by Time magazine. The national attention surrounding the controversy led popular singer Harry Belafonte to offer to fund Conrad's education at any institution she chose. Eleanor Roosevelt, who had also learned of the situation, paid Conrad's expenses after graduation and introduced her to professional circles in New York. Conrad chose to remain at the University of Texas, advocated for its integration, and graduated with a Bachelor of Music in 1959. When she joined the Equity entertainment labor union, she adopted her father's first name, Conrad, as her stage name, since another Barbara Smith was already registered with the organization.

Her professional career encompassed leading roles with some of the most prominent opera companies in the world, including the Metropolitan Opera, the Vienna State Opera, the New York City Opera, the Houston Grand Opera, the Pittsburgh Opera, and the Teatro Nacional in Venezuela. By 1965 she was appearing with the New York City Opera in the lead female role of George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, and in 1985 she performed in the Metropolitan Opera's company premiere of that same work. She also appeared as a soloist alongside the New York Philharmonic and the London, Boston, Cleveland, and Detroit symphonies. In 1987 she performed by invitation at the White House, and in 1995 she sang for Pope John Paul II in New York City. On the screen, she played American contralto Marian Anderson in the 1977 ABC television film Eleanor and Franklin: The White House Years. Her stage work extended to Broadway, where she appeared in the 1966 production of Yerma.

As an educator, Conrad maintained a private studio, offered artist residencies, and gave master classes. She co-founded the Wagner Theater Program at the Manhattan School of Music, an initiative dedicated to training performers for Wagnerian roles, and served as its vocal director.

The University of Texas at Austin named Conrad a distinguished alumna in 1985 and established the Barbara Smith Conrad Endowed Presidential Scholarship in Fine Arts in 1986 in her honor. Among her other recognitions, she received the Texas Medal of Arts Lifetime Achievement Award in 2011 and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Black History Month celebration in Palm Springs, California, in 2013. The Texas House of Representatives passed a resolution honoring her in 2009.

Conrad's life and the racial controversy that shaped her early career are the subject of the documentary film When I Rise, directed by Mat Hames, produced by James Moll and Michael Rosen, and executive produced by Don Carleton. The film had its world premiere at the South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Texas, in March 2010 and was broadcast on PBS in 2011. It screened at numerous festivals, including the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, the New Orleans Film Festival, and the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, where it received the Social Justice Award for Documentary Film. It also won Audience Award Feature and Black Expressions Award honors at the Indianapolis International Film Festival and was nominated for a Music Documentary Award at the International Documentary Awards.

Conrad died on May 22, 2017, in Edison, New Jersey, from complications related to Alzheimer's disease, at the age of 79. She was buried on June 11, 2017, at the Texas State Cemetery in Austin, Texas.