THE VALUE OF A NAME

Evening Star, Issue 19773, 25 January 1928, Page 12

THE VALUE OF A NAME

FLORENCE AUSTRAL. In an article in tlie London 'Daily Mail’ entitled * Why 1 Changed My Name,’ Miss Florance Austral, the famous dramatic soprano, says; “My real name is Wilson. In tho course of years of training, of hope deferred, of striving for an ideal, I learned the lessons that all artists learn—that though the gift of voice may be great and constant in the same person, you are tot likely to gain the full reward unless you have a foreign name. I am all British, born in Australia, of true British parents. Yet in this country of England, which has given me so much, the country in widen I live, the country to which, despite my Australian birth, I shall always return, I have been described os an Armenian. Even tns Armenian Club of Loudon has written me hailing me as a confrere, offering me praise, welcoming mo as a guest. I trust the members of (he club, and even the author of ‘ The Green Hat,’ if he is a member of tho club, will - forgive me when I say that the gesture, though kindly, disturbed my feelings a little. He, 100, has changed Ids name. When I entered the Conservatorium of Music in Melbourne a good many years ago I wanted to ioarn the piano, but neuritis destroyed . the chance,, and then I had to turn to singing, and learn everything all at onco to catch up with girls who hod been singing all their lives. Thus it was that a nervous Australian came to Covent Garden on a May day five years ago with a high hope and a humblo’heart, mid learned that her name was all wrong. The name is no good, they said. You must have another one; one with a suggestion of something foreign. So I jettisoned the name of Wilson and took the name of Austral, which suggests Australia. and yet has <1 trace of the Continent —though not of Armenia. It is a queer commentary on the psychology of our race that our singers, dancers, and musicians should have to drop their birthright to gain a ‘hearing end appreciation. And the strangest thing of all is that, once this has been accomplished, there is no city in the world that counts so much as London. Cortot, the French pianist, was talking the other day of exactly the same thing. Once it was Berlin, once it was Paris. But today, he said, if you make a success in London in music, then the great cities of the world follow her choice.”