Dr. Gary Heikkila, a dear friend and spiritual advisor, once described Leila Edwards Kukuruza as “an elegant, queenly woman with a marvelous sense of humor and a larger-than-life personality.” This description, however apt, is only an introduction to the Leila we all knew. At the risk of being clichéd, to know her was definitely to love her.
Many of her friends knew her much longer than I was blessed to know her. For me, simply meeting her was a cherished experience. It’s impossible to do justice to describing the life of someone such as Leila Edwards, but I suppose the beginning is as good a place as any to start.
Leila Lustman was born on March 28, 1912, in New Haven, Conn., (two weeks before the Titanic sank) and the classical music world has never been the same since. Blessed with the robust health and remarkable beauty of her Finnish stock, this adorable little girl began demonstrating her affinity with music at age 4, beginning with the piano and the violin. Practicing music was much more a part of her childhood than any doll or an army of playmates. Her mother, unfortunately, was not a part of her life during those years, but her adoring father did a remarkable job raising a little girl who thought the violin and the piano were the greatest toys on earth.
Let’s leap forward in time, to the young woman who stunned the classical music world in the early 1940s by becoming the first female to be accepted into the “brotherhood” of classical accompanists. In the 1930s, Leila made one of her first brilliant moves, availing herself of the expertise of Armando Agnini, who collaborated and actually lived with Puccini. Agnini was a stage director at the Metropolitan Opera for 16 years during the “Golden Years.” He also spent 25 years building the San Francisco Opera Company and doing the same in New Orleans.
The two worked together at the Met. “We worked 25 hours a week, or more, in private lessons, as well as group coaching,” Leila recalled. “I learned personal patience from watching him at work. He gave the same careful, sincere attention to the beginner in acting as he did to the Met singers. We must have given hundreds of lessons with the opera La traviata, and never once did I see him show a trace of boredom. Above all, his attitude was kindly. He worked with the talent the pupil showed and never imposed his will. He guided; he suggested. I have tried, since those years, to use his great example and translate it into my work.”
Leila certainly did that. After acquiring a treasure of knowledge from Agnini, Leila began her coaching career, imparting this priceless information to some of the greatest names in the operatic world, including (to mention only a few) Jussi Björling, Salvatore Baccaloni, Robert Merrill, Martial Singher, Kurt Baum, Jan Peerce, Ramón Vinay, Mario Lanza, Claramae Turner, Russell Christopher, Chester Ludgin, Sherrill Milnes, Justino Diaz, Nicola Moscona, Cornell MacNeil, Richard Cassilly, Dominic Cossa, Theodore Uppman, Brian Sullivan, Robert Weede, Licia Albanese, Herva Nelli, Dorothy Kirsten, Irra Petina, Mimi Benzell, Rosalind Elias, Gladys Swarthout, Mignon Dunn, Stanley Carlson . . . and the beat went on . . . and on . . . and on. Every one of those fortunate performers stood in front of the same 1943 Steinway grand piano, which at this very moment, still sits in the apartment she occupied for more than 68 years. Sixty-five years ago, that piano cost her $1,495 brand new, and the tax was only $14.95.
The highlights of a career like Leila’s are both exciting and humorous, such as her introduction to Mario Lanza. Freely paraphrased, it seems that Robert Merrill, after hearing the brilliant young tenor, decided to bring him to Leila. After Lanza sang an aria Leila said, “You learned that from the Gigli recording, didn’t you?”
“How on earth could you possibly know something like that?” asked Lanza, astonished.
“You made the same mistakes Gigli made,” she replied.
After that experience, Lanza autographed a picture to Leila: “One of the very few people I actually miss working with—and a great friend.”
Accompanying Robert Merrill and Gladys Swarthout at Harry Truman’s 1949 inauguration was one the exciting events of Leila’s career. She also concertized with Robert Merrill throughout the country for many years and accompanied his singing of “The Lord’s Prayer” at a memorial tribute to Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1945.
After she married Harry Glickman, Arturo Toscanini’s concertmaster in the NBC Symphony Orchestra, Leila got an introduction to the legendary maestro, who commented on her playing by saying, in Italian, of course, “You certainly know your stuff, young lady.” After her divorce from Harry, Leila met the love of her life, or as she put it, “her soul mate,” Valentine Kukuruza. Kukuruza was born in 1914 in Manchuria and became a citizen of the newly born Soviet Union in 1917. Val was a member of the world-famous Russian singing group The Don Cossacks, a choral conductor, played the trombone, had a magnificent tenor voice, and was a master carpenter with a wild sense of humor.
In the mid ’60s, the New York Singing Teachers’ Association invited Leila to speak at an event. She offered the following remarks on how she felt about her job as a coach and accompanist. “If I may be subjective at this point, the most important consideration with a singer new to me is that he or she be able to turn to me sympathetically, never in fear. I want to help to develop in them courage as a person to face the difficulties of the future in a complicated profession. It is frequently appalling to discover in a new student a lack of self-confidence based upon that old wives’ tale that singers are bad musicians. I quarrel with that statement. We can be proud of the accomplishments of our youngsters in the business.”
Leila conveyed that same attitude to every singer with whom she worked, be they Jussi Björling or John Smith. They all got the same attention and concern. She once confided to me that “even some of the biggest and most successful had self-confidence issues.” From my own personal experience, she seemed to call everyone “dahling,” with just a tinge of a charming New England accent—and it was anything but an affectation. She truly adored her students, with a few rare exceptions. Leila grew up in Worcester, Mass., or as she called it, “Woosta.” Her fondness for cruises took her and her dear Val on more than 35 cruises all over the world.
Leila was never one to miss a photo op. Sixty-eight years’ worth of memorabilia—volumes of photographs, documents, programs, and letters—could literally fill an entire room. The photos range from a nude, 6-month-old Leila, to a beautiful little 4-year-old posing with her first violin, to the glowing and talented musician doing what no woman had done before, to a family heritage that spanned two continents, to a beautiful 96-year-old waiting impatiently to join her beloved soul mate.
How many of us will be able to look back, when our time comes, and say, “I’ve lived a wonderful, long, healthy life doing exactly what I love doing for the people I love—and I enjoyed every magnificent second of it”? Leila did, and everyone who knew her is better for it.
