Prakseda Marcelina Kochańska (February 15, 1858 – January 11, 1935), known professionally as Marcella Sembrich, was a Polish dramatic coloratura soprano. She is known for her extensive range of two and a half octaves, precise intonation, charm, portamento, vocal fluidity, and impressive coloratura. Her voice was regarded as flute-like, sweet, pure, light, and brilliant. She had an important international singing career, chiefly at the New York Metropolitan Opera and the Royal Opera House, in London. Early life Sembrich was born at Wisniewczyk which lies in the Polish region of Austro-Hungarian occupied Galicia, now part of Ukraine. The young Sembrich first studied violin and piano with her father, and earned money to support her family and pay for studies by playing for parties of nobility. She would often play in the town center, and became well known and liked by locals. An elderly man nicknamed Dziadek Lanowitch, took a liking to her and at age ten sent her to the Lemberg Conservatory in what was then Lwow, Poland. Education While at the Lemberg Conservatory she studied piano with her future husband Wilhelm Stengel and violin with Sigismond Bruckmann. When she was sixteen years old Stengel took her to perform for Franz Liszt in Weimar. Liszt encouraged her to develop her voice: ‘Sing, sing for the world, for you have the voice of an angel.’ This led Sembrich to pursue musical studies in Vienna and Milan. In the Autumn of 1875 she began her studies at the Vienna Conservatory, studying voice with Joseph Hellmesberger Sr., piano with Julius Epstein, and voice with Viktor Rokitansky. After a year it was decided to give up study of the violin and piano and fully devote the young student to voice lessons. She arrived in Milan in September 1876 to study with one of the most renowned vocal teachers on the continent, namely Giovanni Battista Lamperti, son of the eminent teacher Francesco Lamperti, with whom she would later study in 1885. Career After less than a year of study with the younger of the two Lampertis, Sembrich made her debut in opera at Athens as Elvira in Bellini's I puritani on June 3, 1877. She sang not only I Puritani, but also Dinorah, Lucia di Lammermoor, Robert le diable and La sonnambula! It is a testament to her proper early training and intelligence that a 19-year-old soprano could learn so many roles in a foreign language