AMUSEMENTS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8455, 25 October 1905, Page 1

AMUSEMENTS.

c MISS JESSIE MACLACHLAN: Miss Jessie Maclachlan gave the firat of her two farewell concerts in the Canterbury Hall last evening. By a. mistake, her advertised programme was one of tli© three given .on. her previous visit, but the programme actually submitted was essentially different from any ot these. The attendance was not so large as was expected, but the large hall was about three parts full, and tho audience was enthusiastio in the highest degree. Mr Robert Buchanan, in addition to playing all the accompaniments, gave two solos on Scottish and Irish themes, and Mr John M'Linden, the violincello player of the party, gave four contributions, each of which was heartily oncored. A Scottish fantasia, in which " Logic o' Buchan " and " Charlie m My Darling were prominent themes, so won the Scottish hearts among his hearers that an encore' was not to. b© denied, and " Auld Rcbin Gray " was given with such feeling as almost to draw tears. Miss Maclachlan was in splendid voice, and reached the heart of her audience with her first song, Roeckel's " Angus Macdonald." Many Scotsmen look rather coldly on this baliad, but after Miss Maclachlan's rendering of it last night, and her revelation of the deep feeling of its poetry and music, it may, perhaps, find more, favour with colonial Scottish singers. Her encore song was a shepherd's lullaby. Her second number on the programme was a double one, Baroness Nairne's Jacobite song, f" The Auld Hops©," sung as its pathos requires that it should be, and Sir Walter Scott's " Blue Bonnets Over the Border." Miss Maclachlan sings " Blue Bonnets " with an air and effect that would make a Highland sergeantmajor green with envy. Her staccato "march" . . • "march" comes short; sharp and decisive, like the crack of a rifle, and she throws her whole soul into the sonc. She gave "Gamin' Through the "Rye," and her way of telling the. pawky story prepared the way tor the more broadly pawky one of "The Laird o' Cockpen, which convulsed her hearei'B with laughter, and she responded with " Rory o' More," the good old Irish gem. In the second part of the programme she sang the "March of the Cameron Men" in Gaelic. Highlanders claim that Gaelic is essentially the language of love and of war. Lowlanders say that Gaelic from the lips of a man is harsh and grating on the ear; but from those of a woman 6oft and pleasing as " winds in summer sighing." Be this as it may, Miss Maclachlan's singing of tlie famous "march" was full of,. fire and energy, but there was no grating of the ruggedness of the norMand tongue upon the Sassenach ear, and in her encore song her Gaelic was liquid as Italian. Her last song was the patriotic song, "Highlanders, Shoulder to I Shoulder," an item quite as effective as any in her repertoire. In the first part of the programme the Scottish Society's message of kindness was sent to Miss Maolacnlan in the shape of a bouquet of white flowers, borne to her on the stage by Mona JFraser. On Thursday night Miss Maclachlan will sing at Waimato, on Friday she goes still further south, and as every night of her stay in New Zealand is filled in till the departure of the next San Francisco mail-boat, to-night must b« her final appearance in Ohristchurch.