STAGE JOTTINGS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 88, 15 April 1899, Page 4 (Supplement)

STAGE JOTTINGS.

Mr Ernest Toy's Concert Company concluded its Dunedin season last Sat-^ urday, and was to open at Christchurch this evening. Mr Toy, a young1 Victorian violinist, has with him Mis 3 Uenee Lees, a clever solo pianiste, Miss Alice Simmons, a soprano vocalist, and Miss Maud Dalrymple, a contralto, with Mr Marcus as business manager. While in Dunedin the Company assisted at a benefit tendered to Miss .Maud Williamson. .

Pollard's Opera Company is appearing at Wellington. During the present season they will produce a new burlesque written round the story of 'Black-eyed Susan;' Mr Bert Royal is the librettist of the new work, and Mr Harrison has composed the music. ,It is said that Mr Pollard has secured from Messrs Williamson and Musgrove the right to produce 'The Geisha' in this colony, in which case a visit from the Royal Comic Opera this winter seems very improbable.

Mr George Rignold's recent production of 'Othello' at the Criterion Theatre, Sydney, is warmly praised by the Sydney press. The 'Herald' writes of it that it is 'one of the memorable events in the history of the Atistralian stage—memorable, because it added one more to the narrow and contracted list of English-speaking actors of the present generation who can rise to the imperial greatness of such aswelling theme as Othello. Mr Rignold as Othello, Mr Harry Diver as lago, and Miss Lilian Wheeler as Desdemona, each appears to have made a hit.

The hundredth performance in Sydney of 'The Geisha' was celebrated the other evening. To mark the occasion each lady patron was presented Avitit a souvenir programme;; containing excellent photographs Of 'the members .of the Company.

Mr 'Tommy' Hudson, pt;Jiktt4§an';Si Surprise' Party, has returned to Aus-: tralia from India. He is at present iij Adelaide.

Mr Kyrle Bellew has been, engaged to play the part; of Oliyier •mi Sir Henry Irving's play, Robespierre,, at the Lyceum Theatre. The-new play will be staged early this month, and the importance of the event will be considerably enhanced by the presence of the distinguished author, Victcrien Sardou, who on that occasion will witness a London premiere for the first time in his life.

'Lord and Lady Algy' has reached it 3 300 th performance at the Avenue Theatre, London. In Melbourne, where the Brough Company produced the play last month, it ran for just a fortnight. Mr Charles Arnold tells an excellent story in connection with his clergyman's costume in 'What Happened to Jones. He wanted to be perfectly correct, and for that purpose went to one of the best-known ecclesiastical tailors in London. The cutting-room was full of • divines, from bishops down to curates, dear old gentlemen, and timid-looking Robert Spaldings. Mr Arnold was almost the only man in mufti. Quoth he to the cutter, 'I wish the gaiters and knickers very tight, as I have to put on my commer-cial-traveller's trousers over. them. There must be only about four buttons on the waistcoat, the rest to be dummies, as I have to do a quiclr change in the wings.' At this the gentlemen rose, metaphorically. The dear old Dean looked alarmed through his big gold glasses; the curates looked like f lightened fawns, for never had they seen such a fellowpriest before. In due course Mr Arnold received at his private address his clerical costume, addressed to 'The Rev. Charles Arnold,' for such is the force Of habit that the clerks in the establishment had forgotten that he was only playing at being a priest. —'The Sketch.'

Madame Melba advises young singers to save their voices.^ In an article in the 'Buffalo Courier' she writes:-— 'I take lots of physical exercise, and save my voice for the public. Young students do too much . practising. They will not gain anything by spending so many hours at the piano tiring out their voices. They must exercise more, eat regularly, and take plenty of beauty sleep. The greatest economy of vocal freshness is to. phrase carefully upon the keyboard and commit music to memory, even attempting to hum it over. The great .mistake that young artists often make is to take a new'role to the piano, and instead of committing it perfectly to memory, without employing the voice at all, they immediately begin to sing it. They hack arid hack at their voices, not for the purpose of execution, but simply to memorise what /, they might as well do with their .fin-,.' gers on the keyboard. No one shall ever catch me simply memorising on my voice what can be done quite as well on a mechanical instrument. When the music is firmly engraved upon my mind I employ my voice-* not before. When Ido sing, with tha, exception of my rehearsals at the theatre, I invariably practise pianissimo. I strictly deprecate the habit of forte practising, and cannot im-. press too strongly upon my sincere friends, the young and 'ambitious, singers, the damage, and the irrevoc-. able damage at that, which accrues from, the unwise—not 'to say criminal —habit ..of loud practising-..1i . you ;.-> practise forte, you cannot sing pianissimo afterwards. Always reserve your forces. Sing pianissimo in private, and the forte will come all right in public' . ■