ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a biography of mid- to late-19th-century Victorian vocalist Louisa Pyne. The name of Louisa Pyne is one of those which, a century and more after her lifetime, is still recognisable to anyone with the slightest acquaintance with the Victorian theatre and music worlds. It is known, however, almost entirely for one reason: her involvement with the so-called Pyne and Harrison English Opera Company, which for more than a decade produced and played English opera and opera in English on the British and, for a while, the American stage with a success and at a level which no other company at that time achieved. The final new production of the Princess's highly successful season was something of an anticlimax. Another Schira piece, The Orphan of Geneva, was put on the stage with Louisa Pyne as its titular heroine, Therese.
