“MELBA AN IDEAL.”

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 366, 7 March 1932, Page 7

“MELBA AN IDEAL.”

Marie Bremner’s Tribute to Prima Donna. ACHIEYING STAGE SUCCESS. It has become almost an axiom that to be thoroughly successful in one’s job one must be happy in the work entailed. If that is so, no one has had a better foundation for a career than Miss Marie Bremner.

the charming and capable star of the Mi| company now playjS ing the light operas of Gilbert and Sul%Ss livan at the Theatre M Royal. 9 “It was all very Jjf simple,” said Miss B Bremner. when tellB ing an interviewer B how she came to embrace a <;tage career. " I was fond r of singing. and

studied music hard, and a Melba scholarship gave me a real chance to do something.” It certainly sounded simple, as she told the tale, but it was not difficult to see that a lot of hard work and determination, as well as Miss Bremner’s generous vocal and histrionic gifts, had been needed to ensure the steady rise to stardom that she has achieved. Before she won her scholarship Miss Bremner was practically selftaught, except that she had the advice and help of her parents, both of whom were intensely musical. The Bremners were New Zealanders, living in Dunedin, and Mr Bremner was well known in musical circles in the southern city.

The scholarship brought three years’ study at the Albert Street Conservatorium and occasional lessons with the great Melba herself, and of the prima donna Miss Bremner cannot speak too highly. ‘ Melba was an id<?al to me, and still is.” she said. “Nothing will take that impression from mv mind. She was generous and kind to a degree, but hated to be thanked for anything she did. She could be bluff and abrupt on occasions, but I think that that was mostly due to self-consciousness. Many were the poor girls she started on the road to a successful career, and she never forgot an old pupil. Some said that she was too ready- to advise girls to study abroad, and then “ drop ” them. That was not so. It depended entirely upon the girl.” After chorus parts, understudying (a lonely and unsatisfactorv job, Miss Bremner says), and starring in musical comedies and musical plavs. Miss Bremner describes her work in the Gilbert and Sullivan operas as a wonderful singing experience.

Everything,” she said, “is written lor singing. 'I he words and music are so wonderfully attuned. It is so good { °l 1 m sure my voice has improved 100 per cent. It is possible to slip mt° bad habits in musical comedies, where some difficult passages are complicated by awkward words, and one just has to get through it in the easiest way. “ Gilbert wrote these operas with his tongue in his cheek, and it does not do to take them too seriously', or their real value might be missed,” was her incisive commentary-.