Ileana Cotrubas, the Romanian soprano admired internationally, has died at the age of 87. She lived in Great Britain at the start of her career and later made her home in Vienna with her husband.
Cotrubas's lyric soprano voice was characterised by its tightly focused tonal quality, which combined inner strength with vulnerability. She was also recognised as an excellent actor, often portraying wounded women on stage, with her Violetta in La Traviata being a notable performance.
Her career included debuts at Glyndebourne in 1969 as Mélisande, Covent Garden in 1971, and La Scala in 1975. She also became a company favourite at the Vienna State Opera, undertaking 109 performances until her final one in 1990.
Cotrubas was an avowed traditionalist and gained a reputation for speaking out against what she considered excessive directorial intervention. She co-authored two books with her husband, Manfred Ramin: an autobiography, Opernwahrheiten (1998), and a polemic, Die Manipulierte Oper (2017).