Caroline Frederikke Müller née Halle (5 February 1755 – 17 November 1826) also known as Caroline Walther,üller– was a Danish and later naturalized Swedish opera singer (mezzo-soprano). She was also active as an instructor at the Royal Dramatic Training Academy. She was a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music and a Hovsångare.
She was born as Caroline Halle, was known in Denmark as Caroline Walther (1774–80, during her first marriage) and known in Sweden as Caroline Müller (from 1780, after her second marriage).
Life
She was the illegitimate daughter of the ensign Christian Frederik Halle and Johanne Christine Hansdatter. She was the half sister of the actor .
Career in Denmark
Her stepfather Thomas Jespersen was a machinist at the Royal Danish Theatre, and had her enrolled as a student in the Royal Danish Ballet in 1761, at the age of six. Soon, she was also assigned small children's parts at the theater. The theater had not yet an organized theater school, but she was tutored in declamation by Dorothea Biehl and drama by Lisbeth Cathrine Amalie Rose.
She debuted as an actress at the age of thirteen in the role of Pernille in Ludvig Holberg's Den Stundesløse in the season of 1768-69. She made a success and soon became the leading soubrette actress of the theater. In 1771, she made a debut as an opera singer in the main female part of Tronfølgen i Sidon by Giuseppe Sarti. In 1773, the theater organized an opera school, and she was successfully educated in opera singing by .
In 1773 she left her abusive mother and the following year, she married the music director and secretary Thomas Christian Walther (1749-1788): the marriage ended in 1775 when he left Denmark, but she was thereafter known as Caroline Walther.
She performed over 124 roles at the opera theater: as a soubrette and tragedienne in theater productions, and in the female leads of the opera. As an opera singer, she also participated in concerts at the royal Danish court. She is considered to have had a great impact on the great age of Danish opera in the 1770s and has been referred to as the "perhaps greatest female stage artist" in Denmark at that time. She was painted by Jens Juel, praised by the poet Johannes Ewald and the Det norske Selskab, and the critic Peder Rosenstand-Goiske wrote: "The fire and emotion, that she understands to give her action, reveal the great genius of her mind."
In 1777, general H. H. von Eickstedt became director of the Royal Danish Theatre. von Eickstedt reportedly undermined her position because he wished to benefit the career of his lover, Catharine Frydendahl, and it is noted how he gave the role in Ewalds Fiskerne, which was written for her, to Frydendahl. The conflict culminated when von Eickstedt refused to give Caroline's lover, the German violinist Christian Friedrich Müller (1752-1827), a position in the theater, ordered him exiled from Denmark and delayed Caroline's divorce. Reportedly, the theater direction feared that they would lose her if she married a foreigner. In 1780, not long after Caroline had finally been granted her divorce, Christian Friedrich Müller left Denmark for Sweden, and soon after, Caroline left Denmark in the guise of a man after her performance as Louise in Desertøren and reunited with him in Gothenburg in Sweden, where they married. They had one child, Caroline (1791).
Career in Sweden
In 1780, Caroline Müller was engaged at the Royal Swedish Opera in Bollhuset in Stockholm, where she debuted in Alceste by Glück. Despite her Danish accent, she made a success, and Johan Henric Kellgren wrote: "Yesterday I cried for two hours at the opera, when Alceste was played for the first time: Mrs Müller made her debut. One might say that there had been no performance or an actress in Sweden before."
In 1782, as she was scheduled to perform in the inauguration performance of the new building of the Royal Swedish Opera, Caroline Müller and her spouse suddenly left her contract in Sweden and left for London to escape her creditors. In London, she became the first Danish opera singer to perform outside of the Nordic countries. In 1783, she returned to the Royal Swedish Opera when King Gustav III of Sweden offered her an immunity against her contract crime and raised her salary, and her husband was given a position at the Kungliga Hovkapellet.