MUSIC.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19251, 15 August 1924, Page 3

MUSIC.

NOTES AND EECOEDS. A new dramatic soprano has swum into London’s ken, Signorina Giannini, a girl of 21, who appeared at Queen’s Hall, and instantly impressed her audience as the possessor of a wonderful voice, in point of fact this quite unknown singer made the success usually described as “furore,” and her fame was established in a single night. The voice is described as one of great brilliancy and power. The quality of it is rich and round and belllike throughout its compass, and, as the youny lady is a singer with a temperament, such a voice and such an enthusiasm of singing will doubtless assure to her a distinguished career. She was heard again as the soloist at an orchestral concert conducted by Henri Verbrugghen—his first appearance in London since he left for Australia some years ago. Miss Dusolina Giannini is described as the possessor of a Madonna-like head, with deep darkbrown eyes and raven hair coiled at the back. When a Daily Mail reporter interviewed her she laughed with the simple delight of a child as she spoke of the great reception she had been given in London. “It has all been very wonderful.” she said,” but, of course, everything in London is wonderful. It is the first time I havo been away from the United States, where T was born. London people are so polite! [ wanted a taxicab to-day, and when I could not attract the attention of the driver all the people round about cried out to him to stop and pick me up. That could not have happened in New York.” Miss Giannini insists on having a good meal just before giving a concert. ‘T must have, ray food,” she said. “On Thursday before the concert I had a steak weighing three-quarters of a pound and two glasses of Chianti. Why shouldn’t I ? I do not wish to play the delicate Lady!” She is an outdoor girl, and plays lawn tennis and golf, swims, and rides. She is also an accomplished pianist. To get back to “Maritana” at the Scala, observes a writer in the Daily Chronicle, was to get back to the simple life in operatic music. One was not mentally overstrained by musicaT'-thrills and fireworks, and it was a relief for one evening at least to be served a liberal dose of sweet and even-running Victorian melody, tor the eyes of some in the audience was a tenth and extra principal. Old Father Time. He was always flitting across the stage when such old favourite melodies as “Let me like a soldier fall,” and “Scenes that arc brightest” were being sung, and sung very well. The Carl Rosa company was in particularly good fettle, and sang with great animation, prominent successes being scored by Miss Eveline Birks, Mr William Roland, and Mr Booth Kitchen.

“Sims Reeves by his genius, by his conscientiousness, and by his glorious gift of voice, occupied a position which no other singer has ever approached. He was without a rival.’’ Thus Charles E. Pearce, in his introduction to “Sims Reeves—Fifty Years of Music in Jingland.” one of the most interesting musical publications issued this year, and by Stanley Paul and Co., London. The value of the book to the general music-lover lies in the fact that the career of Sims Reeves synchronises with the phases and development of musical art in England during the Victorian era. In these days, when music has taken on so many changes of expression, the period seems quite remote, so rapid have been the developments of music in various directions. During the greater part of the 50 odd years that Sims Reeves was before the public he was identified with' opera, with oratorio, and with ballard singing in a way which made him a popular idol. The inception of his biography is due to the great singer’s son, Herbert Reeves, who suggested the task to Pearce. It was begun in 1916. A quintet of Negro singers, the “Fisk University Singers,” of Nashville, Tennessee, gave a successful concert at Aeolian Hall, London, a few weeks ago. Their pieces—hymns, and such popular songs as “Old , Bjack Jo,” simply harmonised—were sung with that sweet, well-rounded and never-forced tone peculiar to coloured folk, and they found easily the soft spot in the heart of the audience. It is reported that Mme. Karinskaya, a former Russian prima donna, has decided to join, the Russian Missionary Society as a missionary.

Of Miss Ethel Osborn’s re-appearance in Sydney after her successful New Zealand tour, the musical critics described her as a “new star soprano,” “a genuine artistic vocal sensation.” and “a prospective world-beater.” It is interesting to find that these opinions have been confirmed by no less an authority than Dame Nellie Melba, who describes Miss Osborn’s voice as the most wonderful she has come across for many years, with its rare beauty and phenomenal compass of three octaves to the B in altisdmo, a pure musical note. Dame Nellie considers Miss Osborn in every way qualified for a great operatic career and has given £IOO towards the £ISOO which will be required for launching her in Europe or America after the necessary period of preparation in Italy. Admiral Sir Dudley de Chair, Governor of N.S.W., and his wife, Lady de Chair, have both shown great interest in the future prima-donna, and it was at the instance of her ladyship that Dame Nellie Melba heard Miss Osborn at Government House, Sydney. Prior to her departure for Europe Miss Osborn will be heard in a series of concerts throughout the Commonwealth and New Zealand, for which her teacher, Mr Roland Foster, of the New South Wales State Conservator mm, is now making arrangements. Meanwhile, Signor Schiavoni, one of the conductors of the Melba-Williamson Grand Opera Co., now appearing in Sydney, is coaching Miss Osborn in. operatic roles. First the gramophone, then the, wireless set (says the Daily Mail) have within recent years sprung to positions of great power in the dissemination of a knowledge of music. Perhaps “acquaintance” is a better word here than knowledge. A knowledge of music is not to be pick°ed up haphazard, .but-(like the other higher pleasures of ■ the intellect) in an inexhaustible mine of treasure, wherein the keener the toiler, the richer the reward. These new aids to musical appreciation leave the more serious devotees cold. ■Those possessing some command of a musical instrument, or the ability to represent to themselves, on the strength of the printed page, the effect of a complicated orchestral work, . are inclined to scoff at the “musical-box’’ tones of the ingenious modem devices for the recording and transmitting of music. They are wrong to scoff. For, while there is no sign that either the gramophone or wireless is ever likely to supersede the actual hearing of music in the concert-room or opera-house, these marvellous mechanical and scientific devices afford a gateway into the musical realm for multitudes who nnght otherwise never have found a wav in. In tonal qualities, in vividness and in grandeur these reproductions cannot vie with the actual perfoirnancc, but they serve to familiarise people with the genera! character of an important-musical work, with its melodies and the order of it s ideas. Concert and opoia, must in the long run gain, for familiarity with good music breeds an increase of love for it, and time will show a new musical public whose interest in Beethoven and Wagner had its birth in curiosity in a scientific invention.