Mamie Flower was known as the “Bronze Melba,” after Dame Nellie Melba, an Australian sopranist.
Flowers was a concert artist who performed with the William Foote’s African American Character Company. The company toured throughout Germany in 1891.
She later joined the Bob Cole’s All-Star Stock Company and was recruited as the prima donna of John Isham’s Octoroon Co. She was the called Mme. Flowers “the greatest singer of her race”. At the time, she was the only known rival of the great Black Patti, Sissieretta Jones.
Flowers left the Octoroons in 1899 and performed with the Al Troubadours, a few years later she was with the Pekin Stock Co, and performed in the Queen of the Jungles which was her last show that was recorded.
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