After a concert tour of New Zealand, Raisbeck sailed for London with her husband James Laurie, whom she had married in 1943. A letter of recommendation from
Eugene Goossens, newly appointed Director of the Conservatory, obtained her an audition at the recently formed Covent Garden Opera Company (now the
Royal Opera) and she made her début as Maddalena in
Verdi's
Rigoletto, later singing such roles as Flora in
La traviata, Second Lady in
Mozart's
The Magic Flute, Mercedes in
Bizet's
Carmen, Wellgunde in
Wagner's
Das Rheingold and Rossweisse in
Die Walküre. Advised by the conductor Sir
Thomas Beecham to become a soprano, Raisbeck studied with the tenor
Dino Borgioli and from 1950 onwards she added Ortrud in
Lohengrin, Senta in
The Flying Dutchman, Third Norn in
Götterdämmerung (all by Wagner), and First Lady in
The Magic Flute to her repertory. Raisbeck was a tall, imposing woman and managed to appear the very embodiment of evil in that role. She often sang alongside her fellow Australian
Kenneth Neate. After leaving Covent Garden in 1953, she sang frequently in concert, and was one of the huge choir at
Westminster Abbey that sang during the Coronation of Queen
Elizabeth II. Raisbeck planned to tour Australia the following year with Benjamin Fuller's Italian Opera, but, finding that she was pregnant, cancelled the tour. After her son was born, she did not sing again until 1958, when she gave guest performances of Ortrud and the title role of
Beethoven's
Fidelio with the Elizabethan Trust Opera Company in Sydney. Returning to London she sang with
Sadler's Wells Opera in 1959, as Senta, and Elisabeth in
Tannhäuser, as well as the Mother in the British premiere of
Luigi Dallapiccola's
The Prisoner, given by the New Opera Company at Sadler's Wells. In 1961, she gave a dramatic performance of Kabanisha in
Leoš Janáček's
Káťa Kabanová. Then, having divorced her husband, she returned to Australia with her son. For the next 10 years, Raisbeck sang wherever and whatever she could: a tremendously successful production of
The Sound of Music, in which she sang the Abbess, with
June Bronhill as Maria, was followed by
Carousel. She gave concerts, and she sang in clubs and cabaret. Then in 1969 the Elizabethan Trust evolved into the
Australian Opera; Raisbeck sang with the company from 1971 for the rest of her career. Her first role was Marcellina in Mozart's
The Marriage of Figaro, followed by Akhrosimova in
Prokofiev's
War and Peace (1973; the first opera performed at the
Sydney Opera House); she scored triumphs as Mrs Begbick in
Kurt Weill's
Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny (1975) and as Herodias in
Richard Strauss's
Salome (1976). Raisbeck had sung in all three of the operas making up
Puccini's
Il trittico – as La Frugola in
Il tabarro, as the Princess in
Suor Angelica and as Zita in
Gianni Schicchi – soon after joining the Australian Opera. In 1977, she sang the Princess again, opposite
Joan Sutherland as Suor Angelica. The Duchess of Plaza Toro in
Gilbert and Sullivan's
The Gondoliers and the Countess in
Tchaikovsky's
The Queen of Spades were both successful; so was Kabanisha (1980). Raisbeck's career formally ended in 1985 with a much-admired performance of the First Prioress in
Poulenc's
Dialogues of the Carmelites. She sang on for another three years, finally retiring in 1988, aged 72. ==Death==