Sophie Braslau (August 16, 1892, New York – December 22, 1935, New York) was a contralto prominent in United States opera, starting with her debut in New York's Metropolitan Opera in 1913 when she was just 21 years of age.
When she was still a child, Braslau's talent was discovered by Signor A. Buzzi-Pecci, a voice teacher who visited her Russian-born Jewish parents and heard the little girl humming. Further influenced by the style of Alma Gluck, Braslau was soon touring widely and frequently in the United States and Canada and, in the 1920s, Europe, using a repertoire which included works in English, French, German, Italian, Russian, and Yiddish.[1]
She retired from her full-time opera career in the late 1920s and performed very little as frail health brought her life to an early close. At her funeral Sergei Rachmaninoff was an honorary pallbearer; the eulogy was delivered by Olin Downes, music critic for The New York Times.[2]