Maria Madlen Madsen

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Maria Madlen Madsen (March 23, 1905 – March 23, 1990) was a German operatic soprano and an actress who also worked in theatre, film, and on television. She sometimes used the stage name Gerda Hansi.

Life
She was born in Krefeld and grew up in Hamburg, where she attended school and studied classical singing with Robert Dähmke for four years. Early in her career she performed as Gerda Hansi. From 1926 to 1929 she worked as a program singer for Süddeutscher Rundfunk and became known as the "Schwäbische Nachtigall" (Swabian Nightingale). She also took part in radio plays, a form of broadcasting popular at the time.

Career
From 1929 to 1934 Madsen sang with the Opernhaus Zürich in Switzerland, where she participated in the premiere of Zemlinsky’s Der Kreidekreis in 1933. In 1934 she joined the Oper Frankfurt, beginning a long, successful run during the Nazi era as a coloratura-soubrette. She took part in important premieres, including Werner Egk’s Die Zaubergeige (1935) as Gretl and Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana (1937) as a soloist.

Her talent led to guest appearances at major houses such as the Berlin State Opera, Breslau, Semperoper Dresden, Hamburg State Opera, Bavarian State Opera Munich, and Staatstheater Stuttgart, as well as international stages like the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, Belgrade, Bologna, and the Paris Opera.

After World War II, Madsen worked with Radio Frankfurt (later Hessischer Rundfunk) on archive and studio productions and collaborated with many noted singers. She was popular in comic stage roles, including Despina in Così fan tutte, Zerline in Don Giovanni, Blondchen in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Marzelline in Fidelio, Ännchen in Der Freischütz, Marie in Zar und Zimmermann, Frau Fluth in Der Postillon von Lonjumeau, Musetta in La Bohème, Adele in Die Fledermaus, and Christel in Der Vogelhändler. She was also respected as a concert and lied singer and, in the early 1950s, sang some popular songs on Hessischer Rundfunk.

From the late 1950s, she appeared mainly as a comic actress, notably at the Frankfurt Kleines Theater im Zoo (and on German television). After ending her singing career she taught voice to young singers in Frankfurt from 1963.

Radio work continued as well; after her early radio assistant work, she became a radio announcer in the 1960s and appeared in radio dramas.

Death
Maria Madlen Madsen died in Frankfurt on her 85th birthday, March 23, 1990.

Filmography
- 1956: Herr Hesselbach und die Firma
- 1956: Der Verräter
- 1958: Der Dank der Unterwelt
- 1959: Kopfgeld
- 1959: Ein unbeschriebenes Blatt
- 1960: Die Friedhöfe
- 1967: Die Namenstagfeier