MUSICAL WORLD.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume L, Issue 16604, 6 December 1924, Page 3

MUSICAL WORLD.

MAGIC SPELL OF GALLI-CURCI

.8000 THRILLED BY "HOME SWEET HOME."

VOICE OF SILVER

FLOWERS AND KISSES FOR ADMIRERS.

LONDON, Oct. 24.—The amazing scenes in the Albert Hall when Aline. Galli-Curci, America's greatest singer, gave her first concert in England can be compared only to a novelist's idea of a singer's triumph. For two hours SOOO men and women, packed in tiers to the great dome, sat under the spell of her silver voice. Her last song over, the audience awakened as if from a trance, and called her again and again. Time after time she came, kissing her hands, waving her handkerchief. The insatiable thousands still shouted and stamped, demanding more. She sat down at the piano, and in a sudden hush sang "Home, Sweet Home." A few thousand took the hint; a few thousands stayed on. The lights went down. There were great red plush gaps in the sea of faces, the sound of departing feet echoed through the hall. Still the wavering crowd that remained stamped and shouted, and—they wero rewarded!

Suddenly, unexpectedly, impulsively Mine. Galli-Curci pressed through the crowd that had invaded the platform. She came to the front through a. lane of arms. A muij tried to shake hands with her; women's white-gloved lingers touched her bare arms. She reached the front of the packed platform, tho accompanist struck a note, and she began to wing. Immediately there was a rush back into the hall. Men and women stood on chairs. Excited people dashed noisily up the stairs and arrived panting with excitement, as through the half-empty Albert Hall rang the notes of a. Spanish song, "Clavclitos." .Fresh carnations; in the 'breeze swaying lightly Ah, carnations! See the dew sparkling brightly. THE CLIMAX.

On (lie last note Mine. Galli-Curci ran to her bouquets and excitedly tore (nit, pink and while carnations, -which she- flung to the outstretched arms. The crowd seemed likely to press her from the platform. She was unconscious of it. She only wanted to give something to the people who had given her so much tribute. In a passionate Latin way, avoiding the officials who tried to lead her off, she rushed to a large basket of giant chrysanthemums and tore at them violently, and, smiling, tossed them to the people. Then she allowed herself to be led into safety. Her first appearance was as quiet [is her disappearance was- dramatic. She came into the packed hall .suddenly; a slim, tall woman in a silver evening gown, a big white Spanish comb standing out of her jot black hair. As she sang her hands sometimes played with a rope of pearls. Her rings moved in fire as they caught, the light. Music lovers and celebrity hunters levelled opera glasses at her. Women gazed at her as only women can gaze at the famous. Then her first silver note hushed the hall and placed a spell over it. Song after song was given in her perfect silver-white voice, each song pure and *\veet like a pearl in a string of pearls. That is Galli-Curci: a silver woman w ith a silver voice. A MODERN PATTI,

Before the concert Galli-Curci herself was unknown in London; it was her gramophone records that filled the Albert, Hall from floor to ceiling. Nobody was Mme. (ijalli-Curci 's voice is as lovely as it s.mndrf on the records and her method (if using it beyond praise. Some connoisseurs talked of the modern Pa Hi, and the comparison did. not seem outrageous. Indeed, Galli-Curci attempted one experiment almost unprecedented in singing "Bellah, capretta adorata," from, the first aat of "Dinorah" away from the theatre stage. It is a song fantastically difficult to make effective on the concert platform, but she sang it perfectly. Speaking generally, the .main charm of Galli-Curci's voice, as one would expect from the records, is its extraordinary clarity. Every note, however soft, is as crystal-clear as a drop of water, and could be heard distinctly at the very back of the hall. Her agility, though of the first order, is no more remarkable than that of one or two other singers.

MME. GALLI-CURCI ON SINGING. HOW IT IS! HER SECRET. To hear Mine Galli-Curci, the great soprano, talk of the art of singing one would think there could be nothing easier than to sing in such a way as to (ill the Royal Albert Hall as she does. "The essence of good singrig," she said to a press represenla,ftlvc, "is to open the throat—widely, I'S when you yawn—and let the voice ]<our out. without hindrance. Anything that causes you to contract muscles is the enemy of good singing. Look at the canary on its perch, warbling for dear life. The ease of its production should be a lessen. Looseness—loose shoulders,. arms, and (host, as well as throat —that is my first principle. STARTED AS A PIANIST. "T. began my musical life as a iyoung girl with piano-playing, at the iMilan Conservatory, and did rather well with it, but 1 have given the piano up completely, .because a pianist's rigidity is opposed to a 'singer's proper state." I Mine. GalA-Curci is an elegant, slim woman of 31, very .much the South'crner—dark, lively, intelligent, with .eloquent eyes and admirable eyebrows. She talks excellent English, and, with all her pardonable pride in her dazzling career, she discusses her art and the world with keenness and sense. HER VOICE'S RANGE. "Mascagni first gave me the idea of singing instead of .piano-playing," she says. "I had always sung, without thinking much about it, but then 1 wmked, training myself, seriously for four years. My compass is from G below* the treble stave to F above it, but all my main work is done in my middle voice, from middle C upwards au octave and a fifth. I am called by everyone a 'coloratura,' but the high coloratura work is only a decorative embroidery. It is the middle voice

that counts —the 'bet!or the middle, the better the top, too."

BEAUTIFUL SINGING

'NOT THE FAINTEST NOTION"

IN ENGLAND

Lecturing' ;it King's College, Strand, Professor E. AY. Scripture, Professor of Experimental Phonetics in the University of Vienna., said England was known on the Continent as the ''land without music."

It was certainly the hind without ihe nihility to sing. He once heard a performance of Verdi's "Aida" 'by a British company. All the people on the stage shouted and screamed in an efl'ori to drown their neighbors and the orchestra. None of them had the faintest notion of bcl canto, the art of beautiful singing. Everyone of thent had been badly trained. Bel canto had been stated by an English vocalist to be a lost art. That was not true. In Vienna he had heard many singers produce . a perfect bel canto. Jt was also untrue that'bcl canto was not possible in a large theatre.

Bel canto was the art of producing beautiful tones by perfect breathing, perfect intonation, and perfect enunciation. The essence of perfection lay in bringing .about the result without effort. Caruso and. Miss Geraldino Earrar, the American singer, could both sing bcl canto. Caruso would come off (he stage qui,to unaffected, while his fellow-singers were dripping with perspiration. Miss ITarrar tossed off her tones with the lightness of a child blowing soap bubbles. Vocal schools in England taught, pupils to breathe laboriously and to produce tones laboriously. The result was the work of a laborer which produced shouting, screaming, wobbling, and gargling, but no beautiful sing;

COOD OLD-EAyHIOIS'ED SONGS,

BETTER THAN THE NONSENSE OF TO-DAY.

There, are signs that many people ait firing of that type of modern musichall song which is a mere nonsensical medley of words set to a sentimental tune, and that they are craving for the return of the "old-fashioned" song.

In a Hong called "Old-Fashioned Bays," which he has been singing to London audiences recently, Mr. Terry Wilson makes a melodious appeal which few can resist. 'The chorus is:—

Old-fashioned days, old-fashioned ways, It's time that you came back once more. Old songs are forgotten, dances too— We never hear them singing as wo

used to do: "In the gloaming, Oh, my darling,

I would ever think of thee —" But what do we see in the new century? They stand upon their hind-legs and roar: '

"Horsey! keep your tail up, keep your tail up, keep your tail up-

Horsey! keep your tail up, keep the sun out of my eyes." Oh, what a craze! Old-fashioned days, It's tinvo you came iback once more! Mr. Wilson said to a Daily Mail reporter:'"! honestly think that if the public were given songs modelled on the old traditions the variety stage would come into its own again. People have had enough of 'jazz' songs."

A VOCAL VICE,

At the Blackpool musical festival, [Sir Richard Terry, the adjudicator, said that last year there were some distinguished renderings in the open solo class, but this year it was distressing to find that nearly every com- , potitor had acquired the vibrato. Nobody sang the vibrato naturally —they either copied some bad singer or someone had taught them .to do it. i It would always bo a vocal vice. "You will never hear a great singer wobble," he said.