Song, Stage and Story.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVII, Issue 50, 29 February 1896, Page 3 (Supplement)

Song, Stage and Story.

The Pollard Opera Company concluded their Auckland season lasb Saturday, and have sinco left for the South, to continue thuir New Zealand tour. Their season here, we understand, was the mdsb successful they have evor had in this city. On maay ftighta they played to packed houses, while on no occasion was there an empty seat in the downstair portions of the houNO. Mr T. A. Kennedy, the well-known meemorist, opanod to a crowded house on Wednesday ab fcbe City Hall. The entertainment provided by Mr Kennedy is cartairily worth going a lone way fco Bee. Charles Ryloy writes from London bo a friend in Melbourne bbifc owing to severe bronchial affection, ho has been obliged to give up nin^ijig. An improvcraonb which amounts alraoab to a revolution in the oiueical world (says 'So. James's Budgefi'} haa just besn introduced by Aleaara S. and P. Erard iv the form of their now piano resonator. This invention, the licensees beiievo, haa hnd no parallel ainca the introduction of thecbeckrepeator action invented by members of their hou*«e in 1821, and they are justified in their belief. For the new resonator has a wonderful, almost ningical effect on the ordinary pianoforte. Its results on the instrument are a groably increased rolnmo of sound, a brilliant fulness and richness of tone, tegvihor with the sustaining and pinging quality that adds largely to the power und charm of tha music. Another advantago is thafe the resonator removes all mafc&llie or wooden harslwiews in the sound production. Ib if- claimed by the patentees that, when old or badly-used pianos aro fitted with tho resomuor, they regain their original beauty and brilliancy of tone ; and from Actual experiment, we mu*b confess that they have thoir claims oliowed. Tho resonator can bo fitted to cottasre aud pratid piarjofortos with equal facility and effect. Id interferes in no wr.y with the consDruction of the piano, a« it is affixed to the re- | verse side of tho soundboard ; nor need there 1.-" \ny change in the inodo of playinpr. It is rumoured that a taarringe has been arranged between Miss Harrie Ireland and Mr liiun Hedley, lately appearing in American playa in Sydney. Fe» men v/ho write o'.ayg, enys the ' Now

York Sun,' have any eloquence in oratory, and it, is a strange thing that most of the men wlio write plays i«re entirely destituteof commanding presenca. Wo fancy him to be as beautiful n» the hero and as eloquent in fini thoughts as the lady who (Jarori everything in order to niaintnin hor virtue and get safely to the altar. Henry Arthur Jones is a little man, with a red beard, who looks like a greengrocer. Arthur W, Pmoro has the appearance of a bad actor in v cheap company. Victorien Sardou is a email, grotesque man, tho personification of aches, pains and dyspepsia. The author of • Trilby ' louka like a priost in a good paiifh. Henry Guy Garleton is a stocky, square-built follow, who stutters. Augustus Thomas) seems like a cross between a prizefighter and a eta^a villain. Sydntsy RosenlieM is an occontric-looking person who wearn eye-glasses and never cornba his hair. Clyde Fitch is a ' nancylied ' fellow, and Sir Augustus Harris is cocky and intolerable. Some of fcbe Italian musical joiirnalf (*ay« Mie 'Era') are lamenting the scarcity of good voices in whao usod to ba 'The Land of Song.' The fact ia modern Italian vocalisfcH sacrifice pure vocal art for piercing, screaming tones to ' split the ears of the groundlings,' or, rather, the less cultivated opera and concert patrons. A journal of Milan ia afraid the reputation of the 'sweet South' for vooal talent; is waning, as in many of the great) teaching institutions no good voices are mat with. Probably the violerir. system adopted by profossorsot ainging rnius the voice ah the very commencement. Times have changed since English singers with fine voices went to Italy to acquire the mosb artistic mobhodij of vocal art). Mr Sims Reeves and many others who have since become famous, completed fchoir studies in Italy, but ab the present timo a student with a good voica bad better remain ab home than run the riik of having ifce quality destroyed in a foreign conservatoire. Rubinstein used to commence Chopin's B'unoral March pianissimo and gradually work it up to iortissimo until it died away again to almost a whisper, A young pianist, Mdmo. Kiecb-Schnorr, a pupil of Le*chetitzky and Mookowski, reconbly adopted a regular programme for thia march in a London concert hall. The funeral proces3ion is heard in the distance gradually approaching the cemetery until, while the body ia being lowered into the grave, there is a pause, and the trio sounds as a funeral hymn, tho march afterwards being resumed at full power and dying away in tho distance. 'Some may objecb,' s»aya tho London ' Figaro,' ' that this is not in accordance with the marks in the printed editions of Chopin's works. Tho marks of expression aro, however, not Chopin's at all; and, at any rate, the late G. A. Osborno, who was one of Chopin's pupil?,, declared that they were the work of publishers and musical editors, and were not inserted by Chopin himself.' Ming Carrie Tapley (meter of tho popular tenor, Mr Joseph Taploy), who recently yifited Auatriia on a health trip, ia about; to settle in Melbourne as a teacher of the pianoforte and solo pianiste. Miss Forteseue, who has jusb arrived in England after a, most successful tour in South Africa, is the heroine of a story which, if nob true; is yet good enough to «et; forth. She was staying at a Durban hoiiei, and late at night thought fib to rehearse hor linen hi ' Romeo and Julies.' No one was astir, and tho evening being beautifully line, sbo repaired to tha open window of hor bedroom to geb an effective rotting for the balcony scene. She gob to the lines, ' Romoo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo ?' when irorn 'neath the casement came the startling reply.^ 'Me no Homo, missy; me John Dale 'ia coolie boy.' The refaeareal was precipitately adjourned. Pauline Lucca, who has dropped completely out of public memory since her retirement from tho operatic otago but seven brief years ago, is living in Vienna. She ia said to be handsome and graceful as of old, and her voice is as good kb over. There is no probability, howover, that Pauline will return to tho stage, as ahe has taken up an occupation which greatly interests her—that ,of training young girls for operatic work. | She confines herself to twalvo pupils a year, and devotes .but three hours a day to teaching.