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Christina Nilsson, Countess de Casa Miranda, (20 August, 1843 - 20 November, 1921) was a Swedish...

Christina Nilsson, Countess de Casa Miranda, (20 August, 1843 - 20 November, 1921) was a Swedish operatic soprano. She possessed a brilliant bel canto technique and was considered a rival to the Victoria era's most famous diva, Adelina Patti. She was a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music (1869). Christina Nilsson was born Kristina Jonasdotter in the village of Sjöabol, near Växjö, Småland, to the peasants Jonas Nilsson and Cajsa-Stina Månsdotter. She was discovered by a prominent civil servant when, aged 14, she was playing the violin at a market in Ljungby. He soon became her patron, enabling her to have vocal training. In 1860 she gave concerts in Stockholm and Uppsala. After four years' study in Paris, she had her operatic début 1864 as Violetta in Giuseppe Verdi's opera La Traviata at the Théâtre Lyrique, Paris. After this success she sang at major opera houses in London, Saint Petersburg, Vienna and New York. She also appeared in the Metropolitan Opera's inaugural performance on October 22, 1883 in Gounod's Faust. Nilsson was married in Westminster Abbey to the French banker Auguste Rouzaud, who later died in 1882. In 1887 she married Angel Ramon Maria Vallejo y