c. 1890 broadside advertising “Black Patti’s Troubadours,” a traveling show starring African American soprano Matilda Sissiereta. Newspapers favorably compared a young Sissiereta to famous Italian opera singer Adeline Patti- she was thereafter was known as “Black Patti” while she developed substantial fame as a vocal dynamo. Sissiereta organized the Troubadors in 1896 and toured with them for several years, playing to both black and white audiences. The highest-paid African American singer of her time, her show included opera, acrobatics, comedy, and minstrel acts. It was produced by the firm of Voelckel & Nolan, who were prominent purveyors of entertainment that traveled across America.

A bold and attractive advertisement, the broadside features a striking engraving of Sissiereta, who is celebrated throughout with phrases like “The World Famous and Unrivaled.”

Condition is excellent, with only a few fold lines noted.


[African-American History, Slave, Slavery, Abolition, Abolitionist, Emancipation Proclamation, Abraham Lincoln, Civil War, Union, Confederate, Document, Letter] [Civil Rights, Martin Luther King Jr.] [Paper Ephemera]