Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1885-03-21

bones and raw head oath not to
| utter note or strike !; key for less
than dollar, she adhered to her unholy
contract and entertained empty benches,
and struggled with debt as a consequence.
That aristocracy among artists should ex-
list, the measure of blue hood in which is
to be taken by the size of the admission
fee rather than the judgment of a dis
eliminating public, seems so absurd as to
excite feelings of luminosity toward the
| whole musical fraternity. Yet it is true
that these people are divided by the caste
which distinguishes fifty cent coin from
q round dollar. Very much the same
false pride and Objectionable eonspirine,
exists among lecturers, and is all the more
reprehensible since they address the in
tellect only The singularity of the whole
matter is that these preachers to the mu-
steal sense, dramatic sympathy, and the in
tellectual part, almost invariably become
plebians these arts so soon
as they get beyond Salt Lake.
city, going eastward. Strange as it may
seem, they experience no sense of degrade
ton in playing, singing or lecturing to
Chicago audiences for from ten to seventy
five cents per head, while in California
they would not condescend to open their
precious lips for less than 81 % to So per
person present to hear them. California
has long enough been fieeced the wall of
exclusion that has been erected about pub
lie entertainments must be broken down.
Eastern singers and home pretenders must
no longer be permitted to cart off our earn
ings at the high rates of an extravagant
pioneer era, long since passed into history.
The public should rigidly "sit down "
upon the whole long line of 81 perform
ances, and firmly retain the seat. We do
not anticipate denial when we aver that
no entertainment can be got up" in Cal
Hernia or imported from abroad, worth an
American dollar as an admission fee. If
the great lights of song and mirth and
science and art and scholarship will not
appear except on the dollar terms, let the
public and the press accept the situation
and content itself by refusal to patronize
them, for as surely as the equalizing process
between the East and West goes on,
Just as certainly will these hlgh-priced
articles in that be offered to the public
at fair valuation The people demand en-
tertainment, and it will be furnished. The
cheap places of amusement are already
driving thorns into the flesh of the aristo-
Gratis of the stage The days of high
priced opera and the extortions of stars in
the drama and great lights upon the ros-
trum are gone forever. The Eastern man
agcr is finding out that the golden goose of
California is ruflling its feathers and refusing
to yield the tithes We shall have public
amusement in plenty, but will pay the
fiddler according to our ability and desire,
rather than according to his exaggerated |
notions of his worth If Eastern actors |
and singers and local lights prefer empty
benches and papered" houses, that is
matter of their own concern, but he is |
blind who cannot see that the California |
public is becoming every day more rebel
lious toward their masters of entertain
ment Theatricals, concerts and lecture
courses have proven miserable financial
failures in California for the past two
years, as whole, and the reason is per-
fectly clear-the public refuses to be longer
plucked. There is no theater, concert hall
Or lecture room in this State upon the
stage of which can be placed any artist to
whom the public will be justified in paving
an admission fee in excess of 81, and to
hear nine-tenths of these stage people, fifty
cents is too large a fee.