Carrie Northey aka Caro Roma (1866-1937): Operatic Diva and Prolific Song Writer

Plot 2, Lot 1

Carrie Northey—known to the musical world as Caro Roma—was among the most accomplished American women composers and performers of her generation. Born in East Oakland, California, in 1866, she was the daughter of a local blacksmith. From these humble beginnings, she rose to become a prima donna who sang before royalty and a composer whose melodies echoed from music halls to parlor pianos across the United States.

Northey’s prodigious talent appeared early. At just three years old, she made her first public appearance at Platt’s Hall in San Francisco, performing one of her own compositions. Her family later sent her east to study at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, where she developed into both a pianist and vocalist of remarkable ability.

She began her stage career under her own name, but by the 1890s she adopted the gender-neutral pseudonym Caro Roma, likely inspired by Verdi’s celebrated aria “Caro nome” (“Dear Name”) from Rigoletto. The name conveyed both affection and continental sophistication, qualities that matched her growing international reputation.

As Caro Roma, she became a prima donna with the Castle Square Opera Company in Boston and later performed at the Tivoli Opera House in San Francisco. Her voice carried her to the concert stages of Europe and North America, and she was even honored with a command performance before Queen Victoria—a rare distinction for an American singer of the era.

Her career soon expanded beyond the stage. Roma composed songs that merged Victorian sentiment with the melodic accessibility of the Tin Pan Alley era, working with such noted collaborators as Ernest R. Ball, Jules Eckert Goodman, and William H. Gardner. Her best-known work, “Can’t You Hear Me Calling, Caroline,” became an enduring favorite. Other popular titles included “Ave Maria,” “Garden of My Heart,” “Resignation,” and “Lullaby.”

Her compositions were admired for their memorable tunes and emotional appeal, though some—particularly “Can’t Yo’ Heah Me Calling”—reflected the racial caricatures of their time. Like many songs of the early 1900s, it employed exaggerated dialects and stereotypes that audiences of the day found amusing but which are now recognized as demeaning and racist. Such works reveal the contradictory nature of the Tin Pan Alley period, when the same culture that nurtured female composers like Roma also trafficked in racially offensive tropes.

In addition to popular music, Roma wrote sacred and poetic works, including “Some Idle Moments” (1900) and “I Come to Thee,” a devotional song set to words by George Graff Jr. She frequently set her own verse to music, bridging the worlds of parlor song and art song.

Returning to her native Oakland in her later years, she remained admired for her artistry and quiet dignity. She died there on September 23, 1937, at the age of 72, leaving what the Oakland Tribune called “a legacy of everlasting beauty.”

Though some of her music bears the prejudices of its time, her accomplishments as a woman composer and performer helped shape the early sound of American popular song.

Sources: The Oakland Tribune (Sep. 23, 1937); The New York Times (Sep. 24, 1937); Wikipedia; California State Library; University of Toronto Music Archives; Find a Grave