Confessions of an Opera Singer Part 11

We returned to Sweden to concerts with Stenhammer, and I should have crossed to Helsingfors to sing _Dalila_, but had to return on account of engagements in Germany.

Through our forbears, as I have said, we have many relations in Germany; and in Berlin we enjoyed immensely knowing our cousins the von M---- s.

The General had just been moved back to Berlin to fill an extremely high military position, and as he was musical we, of course, had much in common. The daughters were all beautifully brought up; simple girls, frank and natural as German aristocrats are. They gave a musical, at which the General and I both sang. Their apartment was very large, but was so crowded for the concert that I felt as though the d.u.c.h.ess of Dalibor sat almost in my throat as I sang, and her enormous pearls distracted me in the "Sapphische Ode." I have never seen such unbelievably huge pearls. We were asked to stay to _Abendessen_ after the concert, and it consisted chiefly of the sandwiches and refreshments left over from the party. This showed us again the absolute simplicity of the well-born German of irreproachable position.

The girls were very intimate with the Kaiser's only daughter, Princess Victoria Louise, and when her marriage to the Duke of Brunswick's son, was celebrated, Irma was one of the bride's-maids. Onkle Geo, as we called him, told us about the Kaiser, to whom he was devoted. At the dinner table, he said, His Majesty would usually talk only with the men present, ignoring completely the ladies who might be present.

When the General made his re-entry into court for the first time after receiving his high office, all the courtiers present watched to see just how he would be received by His Majesty, which would then give the keynote for his treatment by the whole court. After the general reception, General von M---- was invited to go into a more private room with several more gentlemen. This promised well, as it was in this room that the Kaiser talked more intimately with the guests of his choosing.

The General held his helmet with its _Feder-busch_, or crest of white feathers on his arm, and felt the eyes of all a.s.sembled on him as the Kaiser came quickly into the room, and made his way to him. Now was the critical moment that might have everlasting consequences. Onkle Geo confessed to nervousness, but His Majesty guessed the situation, and said, "Hum! _You_ need a new helmet, that _Feder-busch_ is shabby," in a bantering tone. The courtiers knew this was meant for friendly, humorous comment, and was intended to be laughed at, so they laughed accordingly at Onkle Geo's confusion, and the ice was broken. "And my helmet was quite new!" said Onkle Geo, half indignantly, half laughing.

The court was very simple, and we heard stories of this through other friends who had the _entree_. A Graefin D----, returning one evening from a court ball given in honor of the then Regent of Bavaria, gave me a bon-bon done up in silver paper, with a little photo of the Kaiserin on it. The bon-bon was white, and the Graefin said as long as any one could remember, these had been the official souvenirs of court dinners: only the photo varied.

One charming girl we knew, a great favourite of the Empress, came back from the Palace one Christmas day, and told us what she had received from Her Majesty as a Christmas greeting--a small, old-fashioned tippet and m.u.f.f of woolly white Angora, and two small, cheap j.a.panese vases, that some one had given the Empress the year before. The Royal magnificence one would expect gave way to--extreme simplicity let us call it.

The Kaiser took a keen interest in the opera, and gave wonderful presents to his favourite singers. We saw a spectacle at the opera house that he was supposed to have inspired, and which was carried out under his direction. It was a sort of panorama of scenes in Corfu, where he spent much time. It must have been horribly expensive, for I never saw so much scenery at any performance, and it really was exquisite to see those beautifully reproduced scenes unfold before one.

Such things, however, as painted castles and woods and flowers always seem to me excessively nave. The Russian idea of a wonderful imaginative back-drop is infinitely more stimulating to a performance.

Of course, there are places where it cannot be used. If the scene is laid in a Childs' restaurant a back-drop might perhaps be comic to a mind not yet used to making its own pictures; but I hope and believe the aim is towards simplicity in this direction; but the simplicity must be carried out by artists, and first-rate ones. Who, who has seen the leaping figures of the Russian Ballet in "Prince Igor," has felt a lack on the scenic side because the tents with their feather of smoke were suggested on a flat back-drop? Who longed for real, that is, one-side real, tents--with steam escaping from a semi-hidden pipe through the top? The luridness was suggested by colour far more skilfully than if rocks, thinly swaying and lit by red lights, had cluttered up the wings.

Make the audience do the thinking, blend stimulation with simulation, and if your artist has been a true one no one will cry for flapping pillars, or crumpled leaves on a net.

"Boris Goudonow," as it used to be given at the Metropolitan, is a good example of what real artist vision can do with colour. Those who saw those figures in brilliant green, kneeling with their backs to the audience, barring off the procession scene, while the towering minaret of the cathedral carried the eye up and up at the back, will surely never forget the light and shade grouping. It has since, I am sorry to say, lost some of its skilful arrangement, which I suppose is unavoidable, but the performance is still h.o.m.ogeneous and a unit, as to _decors,_ score and costumes.

It was on the Kaiser's birthday that we saw "Corfu," and afterwards we went to the newly-opened Hotel Esplanade for supper. I have never seen such a sight. All imaginable uniforms were there, on all types of officers and foreign diplomats. Some looked magnificently romantic, and some as if they had stepped from the comic opera stage. The women, as usual in Germany, though plentifully be-jewelled, looked dull and inadequate beside the men.

One summer night in Berlin, we went to Max Reinhardt's small theatre, the Kammerspiel, to see "Fruehlingserwachen." My dear friend, Oscar Saenger, was in town, and I had happened to see him in a box at the opera the evening before. He had come to see Berger, the giant baritone whom he had transformed into a tenor, in his first performance of _Siegmund_. I think Putnam Griswold, that splendid type of the best American singer, sang the _Wanderer_ that night. Saenger asked us to go to the theatre with him, as we had not met in years, and by chance we chose "Fruehlingserwachen" of Wedekind. Never shall I forget that evening. The quiet, dark wooden walls of the theatre, and the comfortable box they showed us into, in which we sat, seeing but unseen in the obscurity; the lack of applause when the curtain fell, and then--the performance. German actors lead the world, in my opinion, and the intensity of those players, the skill with which they played those most unhappy children, the tremulous, inadequate mother, that dark scene with its girl-women shriek, left us breathless and dazed.

The highest possible tribute I pay to German actors, and to some of those gathered together that winter in that theatre. Such a _Falstaff_ I never saw as we saw there in "Henry V," nor such marvellous presentations of Shakespeare. Moissy as _Prince Hal_ in his father's deathbed scene; the _Doll Tearsheet_; the collection of hangers-on in the Inn Scene, the understanding of the spirit of Shakespeare--all these were priceless joys. Shakespeare does not spell bankruptcy in Germany, and the people really love it, and perhaps there is a reason why.

The next night in the same house, you might see a translation of a French drawingroom comedy. With the exception of one or two, these people were quite as at home in that as in cla.s.sic drama. That I had never believed possible till I saw it proven. It had always seemed to me that the French were absolutely unrivalled in such things as "Mlle.

Georgette, ma femme"; but they were even more sincerely, yet just as lightly done by Reinhardt's people. It was always such a joy in Europe to go to the theatre in London, Paris or Berlin. To see Lavalliere with her inimitable _gamine_ ways, was the most delicious of pleasures; and the polish of the older actors of the French stage, the _Marquis_ or _Marquise_, or old butler or housekeeper, as the case may be, is a wonderful model for the student. French actors seem to be able to come into a room, sit down at a table and talk for half an hour, using almost no gestures, without becoming in the least boresome or monotonous. When scenes of strong pa.s.sion are wanted, the Germans, I think, excel their French rivals. A Frenchman, or, for that matter, any Latin, is inclined to rant just a bit, and become unconvincing, at least to an Anglo-Saxon mind; but the German, when called upon for strength and power of pa.s.sion, rises thrillingly and gloriously, and completely sweeps you away.

Even in Darmstadt we had many notable performances. That of the "Versunkene Glocke," for instance, was most memorable. We had a splendid old actor for the _Well Spirit, Nickelmann,_ and nothing could have been wetter or more unearthly than his sloshing slowly up from the depth of the well, his webbed, greenish fingers appearing clutchingly first, and then his grating, fishy croak, "_R-r-r-rautendelein! R-r-r-r-rautendelein!_"

The faun was also excellently done by a young fellow with marvellous faun-like agility; altogether these unpretentious people realized the fairy-tale spirit, the wood feeling of the story, in a most imaginative, subtle way. Where in America in a town of Darmstadt's size could you see such a performance?

CHAPTER XXIII

COVENT GARDEN AND--AMERICA

In due time we set out for London. One of our cousins had found us delightful diggings in M---- Street, which I was able to enjoy, as dear Mr. and Mrs. Jones sent me an extra cheque to impress London with. We were waited upon by an old butler, and his wife did the cooking. Such legs of lamb, and deep plum tarts, with lashings of clotted cream! Such snowy napery, and silver polished as only English butlers can polish it.

It was not by any means my first visit to London, professionally. I had sung in private drawingrooms in previous seasons, and had also given a recital. Her Royal Highness Princess Christian of Schleswig-Holstein, and her daughter, Princess Victoria, graciously consented to be my patronesses at this concert. I had not the slightest idea how to arrange for them, after they had kindly consented to be present, but I gathered that a special pair of comfortable chairs must be put directly below the stage, with a little table. Then I thought "Flowers or no flowers?" I should have loved to send them, but English Royalties are so simple and natural I instinctively felt that any ostentation would be distasteful.

Somehow one hates to do the wrong thing in the presence of Personages; it is an un-American feeling, but a human one.

They applauded me a great deal, and after a bow of acknowledgment to the nice audience I gave the Princesses each time an English, straight-up-and-down curtsey, and I hope that was right. In Germany a back-swaying, one-toe-pointed-in-front curtsey was demanded. These things are at once trivial and vastly important.

The decent getting Their Royal Highnesses in and out of the hall I left to the capable manager, to whom Princess Christian said as she pa.s.sed, "She ought to be singing in Covent Garden." I very soon was.

I was rather nervous at the beginning at Covent Garden. Most of the others were so famous, and all of them so much older than I. However, I soon got recognition and they were all very nice to me. I enjoyed especially talking to Van Rooy. He told me all about the wonderful armour he wore in the "Ring." Never have I seen his equal as the _Wanderer_. As he himself said, the old line of singers, the giants, the de Reszkes, Terninas, Lehmanns and Brandts, seemed to have died out. I often look for the grand line, the dignity, the flowing, n.o.ble breadth of gesture one saw in the older Wagnerian singers, but how often does one see it now? Of course, my memories of them are those of a very young girl, but I saw the same thing in Van Rooy, though his voice showed wear, and the bigness of their impersonations is stamped indelibly on my memory, dwarfing the lesser ones.

Nikisch came for the last few rehearsals. He took that raw, English-sounding orchestra, with its unrelated sounds of blaring bra.s.s, and rough strings, and unified and dignified it by his personality, his work and his brain power till it produced what he would have--Wagner in his glory. His gestures were like a sculptor's. My brother, who came to stay with us, also noticed this. Nikisch seemed to sculpt the phrases out of the air, and brought home again to us both the close relation between the lines of music and the lines of n.o.ble sculpture. The Parthenon freeze--is it not music? My brother says the Air of Bach is absolutely one with the outlines of this masterpiece, just as pure, n.o.ble and majestically simple, moving in slow, stately rhythm.

We gave the "Ring" three times and I sang the _Erdas_ and _Fricka_ and _Waltrautes_. The latter in "Goetterdaemmerung" I enjoyed doing so much with Nikisch. We only rehea.r.s.ed it at the piano, and he said as he sat down: "_Jetzt bin ich neugierig. Entweder kann die Waltraute wunderschoen sein, oder sehr langweilig._" ("Now I am curious.

_Waltraute_ can either be very beautiful or very uninteresting.") He did not find it _langweilig_ however.

I had one of my fits of depression I so often get after singing, (when I feel I must leave the stage, I am so hopelessly bad, and nothing any one can do or say cheers me inwardly), and it was particularly abysmal, the day after _Waltraute_. One never sings just as one would like to, and in my head I hear the phrase so much more beautifully done than any one but Caruso can do it. That day I sat at lunch with my faithful Marjorie, who always puts up with me. We were lunching in a little place near us, and I was deep in the blues. Marjorie's eye fell on the _Daily Telegraph_ and we saw a wonderful criticism by Robin Legge; just a few words, but so sincere and appreciative. It helped such a lot. Criticism can mean so much to one for good or evil. The thought of a cruelly amusing phrase the critic has coined, unable to resist the very human temptation, will come winging to you the next time you step out on the stage to sing the same role, and you feel that sardonic wave striking you afresh and jangling your already quivering nerves. It takes courage after that to go on. On the contrary, a few words of appreciation of what you have tried so hard, through such long years to do, will tide you over many black hours of discouragement, and you think: "I can't be so absolutely rotten, didn't X---- write that about me? and he's supposed to know something about it." An intelligent constructive criticism is the most helpful thing possible, and stimulates one to work to correct one's faults. Personal remarks wound one's feelings deeply, and one is obliged to swallow hard and go bravely on, but the policeman's life is not a happy one.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CARUSO'S CARICATURE OF KATHLEEN HOWARD]

The Royal Opera is in the middle of the vegetable market, and on the days when produce arrives, the streets are full of c.o.c.kney porters. It was rather amusing one day, going to rehearsal. I was dressed in my new black satin suit from Paris, and a smart little white hat. A porter caught sight of me, pushed back the other men on both sides of me, and said, "Get out of the loidy's wy, cahn't yer, Bill? That's roight, Miss, I always loikes to see the lydies wen Ahm workin', that's right, Miss, very neat, too." The next day it was raining and I was not so smart, and the same man saw me and said with an air of disappointment, "Ah don't like it 'aaf so well as yisterdy, Miss."

I have often heard of American singers who could "bluff" or "hypnotize"

directors into giving them chances which they thought they were ent.i.tled to, and from which they always emerged with flying colours. This is the tale of how I once, and only once, tried to "bluff," and how I nearly got caught at it.

When the list of roles for Convent Garden was submitted to me in Berlin I had actually sung on the stage all of them but one, _Brangaene_. I always found this lady so weak, compared to _Isolde_, that she had never interested me especially, and I had never studied her. I decided, however, that having sung ninety-nine per cent. of the roles they wanted I could risk the one per cent., _Brangaene_, hoping that Kirkby-Lunn would not relinquish her. I learned the role, though, in record time between concert dates, and trusted to "luck." The season was drawing to a close, and all the operas had pa.s.sed off well, when, just as we were going to dinner one evening, I was called to the 'phone and told Madame Kirkby-Lunn had been taken suddenly ill at the beginning of the first act of "Tristan," would probably not be able to go on in the second, and would I please come right down and make up.

In a nervous tremor, for _Brangaene_ is not easy without orchestra rehearsal, and I was not quite sure of all the business cues, I went down, hunted out something to wear, put on my trusty "beauty" wig, hurriedly went over the second act with an a.s.sistant conductor, finding my memory was standing the strain, and then stood trembling in the wings. I thought to myself "Nemesis!" and shivered. What I hoped was--that if Madame really was going to have to give up it might be just before the lovely "Warnung" behind the scenes, because I had always wanted to sing that.

There I stood and the rouge soaked into my face as it always mysteriously does, when one is not at one's best, leaving me pale and anxious--a real _Brangaene_. Poor Madame Kirkby-Lunn sang just as beautifully as ever though, but fainted after the second act. I went into her dressing room and offered to do the last bit and let her go home after her plucky fight. She, however, said she realized it was a thankless task for a singer to finish another singer's performance, and that she would not think of asking me to do it. She rested awhile, I still hovering, as requested by the management, till all was over; and I then went home, more exhausted than if I had sung a performance, but resolved to sin no more, and thanking my G.o.ds that I had not had to face that critical a.s.semblage without adequate preparation.

The Italian season was to come directly after ours, and they all came drifting in during our last days, to report for rehearsal. One day as I was up in my dressing room, preparing for a matinee, I heard a golden droning below me, rising and falling on half breath--Caruso at a room rehearsal. Words cannot describe the beauty of it, but it gave me exquisite pleasure. A day or two later I was at the Opera House on some errand and chanced to hear the rehearsal of "Pagliacci." Caruso was strolling about the stage, beautifully dressed as usual, with a pale grey Derby hat, gloves of wash-leather and light-coloured cane. The time came for his famous solo. He stood near the footlights with his eyes on the conductor, as we usually do when running over a familiar role with an unfamiliar conductor. He began softly with his wonderful effortless stream of tone, so characteristic, and so impossible of imitation. As the music worked on his emotions, always just below the surface with this great artist, his voice thrilled stronger and stronger in spite of him, till suddenly in full flood it poured out its luscious stream--and one thanked G.o.d anew for such a voice.

Covent Garden on the night of a Court ball holds the most brilliant audience I have ever seen. The English woman is at her best in evening dress, the jewels are fabulous and the whole affair most dazzling. I remember one evening seeing King Manoel of Portugal in a box. It was shortly after his hasty flight from his own country, and by an odd chance his box was just under a very large "Exit" sign, the pertinence of which was striking.

Destinn was our _Senta_ in "Hollander." She was just back from America, and at rehearsal she had to cut out several portamenti which, she said, she had contracted from the Italians, but which infuriated the German conductor. At the stage rehearsals she directed everything in accordance with Bayreuth tradition, which attaches the utmost importance to every slightest stage position; and the other singers followed her directions with an almost reverent devotion. At the performance she was wonderful, as usual. She wore a real Norwegian bridal headdress, a sort of basket of flowers. A c.o.c.kney super, on his way out, remarked in pa.s.sing me, "I s'y, wot price Destinn's hat?"

It was strange, coming from Germany, where every word almost is understood by the audience, to sing to people whose facial expression did not respond to the text; one feels that the inner meaning of the words is lost, is going for nothing, and this leads to a vague sense of irritation, if one allows the impression to dominate.

There were several young Americans with us with glorious voices, straight from Jean de Reszke's studio. They were to sing the _Rheintochter_, and some of the _Walkuren_ in the "Ring." One or two were full of ambition and thankful for the experience they were receiving, while being paid. Some of them, however, showed a quite extraordinary att.i.tude, not rare among students of the moneyed cla.s.s.

The air was filled with their complaints at the length of rehearsals, at the discomfort of the swings for the _Rhinemaidens_, at anything and everything. I was present one day when one of them called Mr. Percy Pitt aside and gravely took him to task for not having the swings adjusted to her comfort--thereby incidentally killing her chances with the management, for a beginner is before anything a beginner in a great Opera House, and is supposed to find her level and make no fuss about it. These girls constantly spoke loftily of their displeasure at the way things were run. When they were offered an extension of their contracts, owing to the repet.i.tions of the "Ring," they could hardly be brought to consider signing on. I said to them, knowing the game, "Girls, some day you will be on your knees to get such engagements as you now hold. You have the chance of singing difficult parts with a great Master in a great Opera House, and you don't seem in the least to realize what that means."

I regret to say my prophecy was nearly correct, for I think only one, a really serious girl, has prospered in her career. The att.i.tude one a.s.sumes to one's operatic work in early years is surely reflected later, and the best advice a student can follow is that given me by Schumann-Heink, "Sing everything, no matter what they ask you to do."

It was very amusing to hear the discussions as to what the audience should wear. We gave the performances more or less on the Bayreuth plan, beginning early and with one unusually long pause. As it was broad daylight at the hour set for the curtain to go up, and as the perfect Londoner loathes to be about after dark in anything but evening dress, the problem bothered many. Besides, evening dress is _de rigueur_ at Covent Garden. Some rushed home in the longest pause to dress and dine; some frankly omitted the first acts and came late, splendidly be-jewelled; some wore evening dresses and kept on their evening coats till the sun was decently down; and then bared their suitably naked shoulders. Others were just dubby and high-necked, and brought sandwiches in their pockets, feeling the holier and more Germanly reverent in consequence.

It is a great help to be able to afford to have some one with you in opera life. Home surroundings are the most conducive to good work, and it is hard to make a home alone; but you do not absolutely _need_ any one, if this is not possible. My "morals" were never in danger--no "infamous proposals" were made to me by agent, conductor or director. In my first engagement, one or two of the giddier members of the company had affairs with young officers--in no case a flagrant scandal, as with a married man. Their relations to each other in the theatre were all that could be demanded. The most exaggeratedly correct behaviour was exacted from me. One day in Metz, for example, we went for a walk in the country with the lyric baritone, a nice little chap, who was a great friend of ours. It was a lovely, frosty day in autumn, and we were walking fast through a forest road, when we pa.s.sed a carriage with the very prim wife of an officer sitting in it. The next day, an acquaintance of ours told us, as a joke, that the same woman had said that afternoon to her, "I thought you told me that Fraulein Howard was a lady?" "So she is," said our friend. "Oh, no," said the other, "she can't be. I saw her and her sister walking with one of the singers from the theatre, and they were behaving very badly." "What were they doing?"

asked our friend. "They were all three holding on to his stick!" said she, in a horrified tone!

I went abroad to learn my business and I learned it. There is much talk about it not being necessary to go abroad to prepare oneself for an operatic career, but the time has not yet come in America when the student can find the same opportunity to practice, or work out _on the stage_ her beginner's faults. In Europe you can do this in blissful semi-obscurity. I hope and believe the time will come when a girl will not have to go through all I went through in order to develop her talent, but may do it in her own country. But the wonderfulness of Europe for those whose eyes are open cannot yet be replaced by America, and a real artist will surely flower more perfectly on that side of the water.

To those who go I can only say that I hope they may have the tremendous advantage of fairy G.o.d-parents, as I had, and perhaps a sister Marjorie.

After the season closed at Covent Garden I met the manager of the new Century Opera, soon to be opened in New York. He offered me a long contract, and I finally decided to return to America. I saw a photograph of Edward Kellogg Baird in a musical paper at this time, and read of his connection with the enterprise. I said to myself, "That is the type of man I shall marry--if I ever do marry."