Adelina Patti (1843-1919), the highest-paid diva in the history of opera, gave her first public recital at the age of eight in New York City and her last at the Royal Albert Hall in London sixty-three years later. She was one of the earliest singers ever to make a recording.
Verdi declared her a nonpareil and she was much admired in both court and musical circles, composers such as Rossini, Auber and Meyerbeer appreciated her as much as Tsar Alexander II, Queen Victoria, the Empress Eugenie and King Edward VII.