Mezzo-soprano Mimi Lerner, Pittsburgh's most beloved classical singer, died yesterday morning of complications from cancer at her home in Oakland. She was 61.

	Andy Starnes, Post-Gazette Mimi Lerner Click photo for larger image. Sign a guestbook

A longtime city resident who was a cantorial soloist at Rodef Shalom Congregation in Shadyside, she performed in major opera houses of the United States and Europe.

But it was her fortitude in the face of deadly cancer that truly defined her.

"She lived with the Sword of Damocles over her head, but she knew she couldn't live like that and be happy. We would take vacations, cruises, go to concerts and plays, even though she had to take oxygen with her," said her husband, Martin Lerner.

She even picked up a new instrument, taking piano lessons just a few months ago.

"She was a really determined woman," said Sheila Chamovitz, a longtime friend of Mrs. Lerner's from Squirrel Hill. "She managed to raise a family, have a stellar career and real courage when she had to face that cancer."

A latecomer to the operatic world, Mrs. Lerner was among the most influential artists on the local music scene. When she signed on to perform with a Pittsburgh ensemble, extra seats often were needed. Her appearances around the world garnered raves. And her voice students loved her.

But there was no diva in this down-to-earth woman.

"You have this idea of an opera singer as gorgeous, 6 feet tall with blond hair ... superhuman and bigger than life," Mrs. Lerner told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in 2001. "I am not a big person. I'm 5-4. Also, I always had to work hard because I don't have a particularly large voice -- though I think it is a pretty voice."

Mrs. Lerner's life began in the midst of extraordinary danger. As Mimi Lipczer, she was born into a Jewish family in Sambor, Poland, in 1945, just at the end of World War II. For several years before that, her parents survived by literally living in the woods, keeping out of sight of the Nazis.

Her grandparents died in the concentration camps, but her immediate family made it to America. Prophetically, her parents moved to within walking distance of Lincoln Center in New York, near the Metropolitan Opera and New York City Opera, where Mrs. Lerner would shine in years to come.

But Mrs. Lerner didn't give a thought to singing at all in her youth. "I didn't go to a conservatory; I didn't even really take singing lessons," she said.

That's not to say she wasn't interested in music. She enrolled at Queens College, where she focused on a career in music education.

Things began to change in 1967, when she went with a roommate to hear the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra at New York's Carnegie Hall and met Mr. Lerner, who was a PSO flutist. A romance blossomed and after graduation she moved to Pittsburgh, where they wed in 1969.

Even then she wasn't remotely entertaining the idea of a singing career. But predestination's work-in-progress was not to be denied. While employed as a music teacher, she learned she was required to enroll in a continuing studies program of some sort.

"I [took] lessons from a woman who was in the Mendelssohn Choir, Norma France," she said. "She had this amazing love of singing and really taught me what a precious thing that is, to be able to communicate. It was more heart stuff with her."

Soon, Mrs. Lerner had received her master's degree in voice and began looking for work on stage.

"When I heard [her voice], I said, 'I have to support this,' " her husband recalled. "That's why I stayed at home and watched the baby. It was an amazing phenomenon that she developed into a singer."

"Music vibrated in each fiber of her soul," said Ms. Chamovitz.

But in 1995, after experiencing shortness of breath, Mrs. Lerner was diagnosed with cancer. When doctors told her they had discovered a tumor in her heart, she responded with the indomitable spirit that was only one of her qualities.

She underwent surgery and six months of chemotherapy, but the cancer persisted. In July 2000, she underwent radical surgery that involved the removal, rebuilding and replacement of her heart. She had recurrences of the cancer, yet survived through treatment. Through it all, she showed the grace, dignity and fortitude that inspired those who knew her.

"She was an extraordinary woman," Mr. Lerner said last night. "Her doctors called her a wonder woman. They couldn't believe how she managed to survive all these years."

"She had an incredibly strong heart, which is why she was able to give so much to the community," said her only child, Dan. "She used that heart to fight cancer for 10 years and she just wore down."

In late October 2001, Mrs. Lerner returned to the stage with an intimate gathering of the faculty and students in Kresge Recital Hall at Carnegie Mellon University, where she was chair of the voice faculty.

As described in the next day's Post-Gazette by critic Robert Croan, "[her] performance was a triumph of artistry, technique and sheer determination over tremendous physical -- and surely also emotional -- adversity. She vocalized her part as a personal statement, as if she were composing the words and music herself on the spur of the moment. Yes, there were some moments of evident struggle, but there were also stretches of extraordinary beauty -- none more so than her final repeated pronouncements of the word 'Ewig' (eternally)."

In addition to her husband and son, she is survived by a sister, Lizette Corman of Oradell, N.J.

Visitation will at 1 p.m. on Sunday at Rodef Shalom Temple, 4905 Fifth Ave., Shadyside, followed by services at 2:30 p.m. Arrangements are being handled by Ralph Schugar Chapel.