People (ArtBase) - The 81 year old opera star Dame Joan Sutherland is in hospital after breaking both her legs in a fall in the garden of her home in Les Avants in Switzerland. Her husband, conductor Richard Bonynge, revealed Sutherland is expected to be in hospital for eight weeks.

The Australian-born soprano, who Luciano Pavarotti once dubbed "the voice of the century", has been living in Switzerland since her retirement almost 20 years ago. She was due to visit family in Australia with her husband. Bonynge is to conduct performances later this month of Lucia di Lammermoor, one of the operas in which Sutherland triumphed around the world.
Opera Australia chief executive Adrian Collette said Bonynge told him the accident was very upsetting but Sutherland " was insistent that he come and conduct Lucia"
Sutherland has been acclaimed for her musical intonation, and wowed audiences during the 1950s and 1960s with her Bel Canto performances. Her 1959 performance of Lucia di Lammermoor at the Royal Opera House in London was considered a breakthrough.
Sutherland's 1961 double LP, The Art of the Prima Donna, won a Grammy Award in the same year she was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire - conferring the title of "dame."