Yelizaveta Semyonovna Sandunova

Yelizaveta Semyonovna Sandunova, also known by the stage name Uranova, was one of the great opera singers of early nineteenth-century Russia. She was born in Saint Petersburg, probably between 1772 and 1777, and died in Moscow in 1826. Her career unfolded within the imperial theatres.

She trained in Saint Petersburg under distinguished teachers such as Paisiello, Sarti and Martín y Soler. She made her debut at the Hermitage Theatre in 1790, in Martín y Soler's opera L'arbore di Diana. A year later she was engaged by the Imperial Theatres, where she achieved great popularity. From 1794 she worked at the Petrovsky Theatre in Moscow alongside her husband, the actor Sila Nikolayevich Sandunov, from whom she divorced in 1810. In 1813 she returned to Saint Petersburg, where she performed frequently until her retirement in 1823.

The name Uranova was apparently bestowed upon her on the orders of Catherine the Great, in allusion to the planet Uranus, discovered in 1781. Her voice, of wide range and expressiveness, places her among the finest opera singers of her era, and she sang leading roles in numerous operas.