Vocal Mastery

ERICAN SING

tic career has been rich in development, and he stands to-day at the top

In 1899 he came to London, singing Don Giovanni at Covent Garden. A few months thereafter, he came to New York and began his first season at the Metropolitan.

nio

CTERI

de his true personality behind the mask of a Scarpia, a Tonio, an Iago, and last but not least, the most repulsive yet subtle of all his villains-Chim-Fang, in L'Oracolo. Perhaps the most famous of them

FOR THE AM

y to appear in opera on tour. To begin this enterprise, the great baritone turned impresario, engaged a company of young singers, most of them Ameri

ture on one occasi

, with lesser known ones in smaller parts. With these I worked personally, teaching them how to act, thus preparing them for further career in the field of

material carefully, for many more app

OPERA IN

me of the best years of my life to singing in Italian opera in this wonderful country of yours. One is continually impressed with the great advance America has made and is making along all musical lines

t part in the future of American musical art. It seems to me there is more intrinsic value-more variety in the works of mo

no way detracts from what Mascagni, Leoncavallo and others have accomplished. It is only my personal estimate of Puccini as a composer. The two most popular operas to-day are Aida and Madame Butterfly, and they will always draw large audiences, although American people are prone to attend the opera for the purpose of hearing som

AN COM

ding American operatic co

removed from actual life that it becomes at once artificial, academic and preposterous. Puccini spends years searching for suitable librettos, as great composers have always done. When he finds a story that is worthy he turns it into an opera. But he wil

TIC T

any. Those four walls, if they would speak, could tell many interesting stories of singers and musicians, famed in the world of art and letters, who daily pass through its doors, or sit chatting on its worn leather-covered benches, exchanging views on this performance or that, or on the

company. To the question as to whether he found young American singers in too great haste to come before the p

opera I mean-is stage routine and a knowledge of acting. This, as I have said before, I try to give them. I do not give lessons in singing to these young aspirants, as I might in this way gain the enmity of vocal teachers; but I help the untried

or money, for I make nothing personally out of it, and you can imagine how heavy the expenses are; four thousand dollars a week, merely for transportation. But I do it for the sake of art, and to spread the love of modern Italian opera over this gre

o sorely needs experience and to educate the masses and ge