Deborah Cook (soprano)

Deborah Cook (July 6, 1938 – April 22, 2019) was an American

Career

Cook was born in Philadelphia,^[1] where she studied singing privately with Irene Williams, soprano.^[1] She sang in a number of student opera productions at Temple University during the early 1960s, beginning with the role of Adele in Die Fledermaus in 1963. She married Philadelphia psychiatrist, Robert L. Kashoff, who died December 29, 1964, shortly after the couple had married. Cook made her professional opera debut on October 31, 1965, at the Academy of Music with the Philadelphia Lyric Opera Company singing the title role in a concert version of Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor with Frank Guarrera as Enrico. However, this performance did not excite the attention that Cook was hoping for and she was forced to take work outside of music for the next several years while continuing with further studies with Williams, and Nicola Palumbo in New York City. She appeared in many concerts and performances in the Philadelphia area during the late 1960s including portraying Galatea in Handel's Acis and Galatea with John Darrenkamp as Damon at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in 1967 and returning there in 1968 to sing Vespina in Haydn's L'infedeltà delusa, both with the Concerto Soloists Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia.

It wasn't until the early 1970s when Cook won a prize in an important singing competition in