Jan (Janice) DeGaetani was an American singer, mezzo-soprano, and teacher. She was born in Massillon, Ohio, on July 10, 1933, and died in Rochester, New York, on September 15, 1989, from leukemia.
DeGaetani graduated from the Juilliard School, where she studied with Sergius Kagen. She performed with leading orchestras in the United States and Europe and taught voice. Her students included Dawn Upshaw and Renee Fleming.
Her repertoire ranged from medieval and Renaissance music to works by Schubert, Schumann, Mussorgsky, Mahler, and Hugo Wolf, as well as modern music. She performed Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire, Hindemith’s works, George Crumb’s Ancient Voices of Children, Aaron Copland’s Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson, and music by Charles Ives and Elliott Carter.
Her recordings included Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire and The Book of the Hanging Gardens, Crumb’s Ancient Voices of Children, Ravel’s Chansons Madécasses, and songs by Schubert, Brahms, Mussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, and Rachmaninoff. Concert recordings released after her death featured music by Gabriel Fauré, Jacob Druckman, Schumann, Brahms, Shostakovich, and other composers named in the album titles.