The Polish tenor Jan Kiepura (1902 – 1966) was one of the most famous opera singers of the last century and remembered throughout the world . Whereas he was a European movie star from some 19 films; his fame started on the opera stages of Europe and North and South America. After his debut at the Lvov Opera in 1924, he sang major tenor roles throughout the 1930s and 1940s in operas as Tosca, La Boheme, Carmen, Manon, Rigoletto and Turandot. He also created tenor roles in new contemporary operas at the time. These included Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s Das Wunder der Heliane and Felice Lattuada’s opera Le Preziose Ridicole. Jan Kiepura sang at La Scala in Milano, Vienna State Opera, Paris Operas, Metropolitan Opera, Chicago Opera, Colon Opera in Buenos Aires and innumerable concerts.
With his wife, the Hungarian soprano and film star Marta Eggerth (1912 – 2013), they appeared in movies together and then entered the operetta genre with successful tours of Lehar’s The Merry Widow among other operettas. Jan Kiepura crossed several genre – opera, films and operetta. His career was unique in that he was a major opera singer and at the same time a movie star.