THEATRICAL & MUSICAL NOTES. NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2120, 11 October 1894, Page 36

THEATRICAL & MUSICAL NOTES. NOTES.

Oontrlkntioni from tho.Frofeiilon ohronioliag their morementt vtA doing! »r* tatlted. All coainiunlomtlons to bs addresied t« "PMquJn, ' Ot mo Wltneu Offloe. There was a good attendance at tLo City Hall on Tuesday night, when the Kennedy Comedy and Dramatic Company produced " The New Magdalen " for a second time. The play went off very successfully, and the company meb with a xnoit hearty reception, especially Miss Lilla Wilde and Mr Lucas, both of whom were called before the curtain two o? three times during the evening. On Wednesday night the company appeared in " The Two Orphans." "B. S." in his this week's notes records the marriage of Miss Linda Raymond and Mr Oily Deering. The number of names possessed bj the fair Linda will be a matter of surprise to many of her Dunedin admirers. Miss Annie Brandt's Dramatio Company reached Dunedjn last week from the .West Coast, after a successful season. It was intended to open in the Princess Theatre on Wednesday at popular prices. The riptrtoire includes sach pieces as " The First Mate, ' " Land of the Living," " Oliver Twist,'* and others. Miss Wildenarrowly escaped a serious acoident at the City Hall on Thursday evening. During: the performance she lights a piece of paper, and throwing it down, places her foot on it. On Thursday night she' failed to extinguish the flame,' and in a moment the trimming of her dress caught fire. Fortunately she noticed what bad occurred before anything serious had happened. • , ■ . ■ It is said that Mr Frank Thornton cleared £5000 from "Charley's Aunt" during his six months' tour of the colony. Miss Pattie Brown, the Australian soubrette actrtss, has achieved another success in the " Derby Winner," now playing at Drury lane. Sir Augustus Han is has engaged her for the Christm»B pantomime at his theatre. The War<?»Lyons Company have been playing " Arrah-na-Pogue" at Adelaide, , with Mr J. P. O'Neill as Shaun and Miss Marian Willis as Arr&h. Scotland is certainly progressing. Sabbath as it wai when Sarah Bernhardt reached Edinburgh — travelling with all the pomp of a little royalty — an immense crowd gathered, and the Scottish capital re-echoed with most uns&bbatarian cheers. Mr Santley, the eminent vocalist, under whom Miss Ada Crossley, the Melbourne contralto, is studying, states that he is highly satisfied with the progress she is making, and expects that she will ,ioon make her appearance on the concert platform in London. The Argus in its notice of Messrs Brough and Boucioanlf s production of " Sowing the Wind" at the Melbourne Princess, says:— "The brilliant success of 'Bowing the Wind r on Saturday evening was due not less to the quality of the acting than to that of the writing. Mrs Brough more particularly distinguished herself in the part of Rosamond AtheUtane, as well by her broad grasp of it as by the fire she infused into her interpretatioiyrf it ; and when two or three repetitions of it snail have enabled her to perceive more clearly and to define more accurately the precise value and jast accent of every note in the crescendo scale of passionate emotion which she displays at the end of the third aot, and represses her habitual tendency to over-emphasise conjunctions and possessive pronouns, her performance of the character will be entitled to be considered her highest achievement. As it is, it is an exceptionally' fine piece of work, full of intelligence, earnestness, and abandon; and nothing could have been more spontaneous or gratifying than the cordial appreciation of its conspicuous merits by the audience. The more serious and pathetic scenes of the play were relieved by the humorous acting of Miss Homer ap a censorious and vain old prude, and of Miss Noble as a giggling hoyden. The Brabazon of Mr Titheradge approashes pretty nearly to the high standard of his Abbe* Dubois, and in the important scene, previously referred to in which he heaps to much contumely upon the mother of Rosamond Athelstane, whom she vindicates with all the passionate eloquence of a woman outraged in every fibre of her nature, the war of the two sexes is oonducted with as much vehemence by Mr Tithex-adge as by Mrs Brongh, until he is almost paralysed by her fleroe adjuration, * Speak no slanders of my mother ; and c»U her by her proper name— call her' Helen Gray.' The situation is a poignant one, and was rendered very real and moving by the two duellists. Mr Brough as the testy old curmudgeon, who does a deal of mischief, with the best intentions, through sheer conceit of his own sagaoity, was excellent; and although it was difficult to associate warmth of sentiment with a man wearing the grotesque oostume of 80 years ago." Madame Sarah Bernhardt cleared £5000 by her six days'' tour in the British provinces. Every afternoon she appeared at a different city, going as far north as Edinburgh and Glasgow, and on a Sunday she gave a matinee of "Phe'dre" at Boulogne. M. Darmont, the Antony of her " Oleopatre " company in Australia, made a great success on this tour as the cruel Baron Scarpia in " La Tosoa." Madame Calve, indignant at the altogether unpardonable and abominable personalities indulged in by some Chicago papers at her expense, has refused to return to America ; so Mr Abbey has engaged Miss Zelie de Lussan, of the Carl Rosa Opera Company, to take her plaos. There was a great scene of enthusiasm here, writes a Johannesburg correspondent of the Sun, when Miss Macintyre arrived here in the course of her concert tour in South Africa. The local Caledonian Society met her at the station, and after presenting her with an address of welcome and a bouquet tied with Macintyre tartan, they unharnessed the horses of her carriage and escorted her to her hotel with a torchlight procession headed by a band of Highland pipers in kilts. The blood of exiled Scots at the Cape was roused to fever heat by the rendering of "The blue bells of Scotland" and "Ye banks and braes " by the lass from Inverness, while those whose taste was independent of nationality were no less delighted by the Scotch prima. doniuvs exquisite singing of operatic selections from Verdi, Wagner, and Gouaod. Mrs Patrick Campbell, asked to talk abcrafs " The New Woman," replied :— " I am leaving town almost at once for a much-needed rest* and regret that I shall not be able to give 'you the interview you are good enough to request. I have nothing to say on 'The New Woman' excepting she will be rather a dreadful person when she's old! My part in 'The Masquer? aders ' was very uncongenial to me,' f ollowiqg as it did the brilliant part of Paula Tanqneray." One of the notable facts of. the Ua6 few operatic seasons in London has been thei renewed and greatly increased popularity of Gounod's " Romeo and Juliet," which, when id was first brought out, in the days of Mario and i n the beat days of Adelina Fatti, made baft little impression. Guonod used even then to say plainly to anyone who spoke to him on fchlf sabieofe that) J* Romeo 'i was his best eoouk Of

it least one of his two best ; the other befog hi coarse, " Faasb." Asked one day to explain hi* views clearly- on tbis point, the charming (jomposer delivered himself in this somewhat Oracular style :— " « Faust' is older, but I was younger ; ' Borneo ' is younger, but I was older." Gounod, however, was as young as his subject, as young as the lovers of Verona themselves, when he composed the beautiful music which is now sung in such perfection by M. Jean de Reszk6 and Madame Melba. — Speaker. Assuredly Lillian Russell* voice is (says a London critic) the purest and the sweetest of all the light opera prima donnas America has Bent us. It is strange how qaiokly these American voices seem to fade. Five or six years ago Miss Geraldine Ulmar seemed to nave before her a future in which, with study and care, she might have achieved even great things ; the range and quality of her voice being exceptionally fine, marred only by a defective ear. Her singing to-day is not even a ghost of what it was ; it seems_as if it might belong to some other -person. Again, Miss Lucille Hill has never fulfilled the possibilities her voice promised. After the run of " Paul Jones," Miss Agnes Huntingdon had not a note to call her own. Miss Lucille Saunders, most dramatic of drawing-room contraltos, was singularly ineffective on the stage, and tte beauty of her voice was never so great in opera as in ballad. There may be perhaps sored atmospheric cause for the quickness with which these fresh, strong American voices fade and dwindle away, but whatever the cause the fact remains, and is indisputable.