The age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1897-1902, 1899-06-04
Some Gossip of the Past Week.

There are so many little stories that reach
ones ears after the season is over that one
wonders how the season passed without
these affairs having become public gossip
long ago. story was told me recently
of which l have wanted to write ever since
] heard it, for it seemed to me quite as IN
pardonable as wrangling over a card game
or seeking invitations or any other sim
liar thing which society frowns upon.
The week of the musical festival, when
then great Boston solosts came down to
show themselves off and at the same time
to show to these soloists down here in the
far south how little they knew, one of the
famous Boston singers, who got herself
up very deliberately even for rehearsaIs,
made herself quite absurd one morning
when the soloists were rehearsing. She had
concluded her solo with apparently a great
effort and seated herself with that grande
dame air that borders somewhat on hateur
No one paid the slightest attention to her
because the people at rehearsal did not
care for her voice any more than the aud
fence did that night. But it was when the
Birmingham Soloists prepared for their
roles in "Olaf Trygvasson" that this self
satisfied diva brought herself into MOTOR
iety by her conspicuous illbredness. With
a great uplifting of her eye brows and a
great shrug of her thiek-looking shoulders,
she listened to the opening strains. Then
this complacent creature, with a curious
smile on her pale lips, looked upward at
the great auditorium ceiling, out along the
aisles, at the electric globes. anywhere to
kill time while the Birmingham people were
singing their parts.
She threw amused glances in the drec-
ton of the singers, winked significantly at
members of the orchestra, laughed immod-
erately behind her fan and otherwise APP
peared bored
This precious grande dame, 20 confident
of her pol1 ba of IT'S HpXi-
bility and range, this great prima donna
of the Boston Festival orchestra could
hardly condescend to listen to a brief re-
hearsal of the beautiful voices In this
southern city.
But this grande dame sat it through
Her thick shoulders settled themselves at
last against her chair. Her eye brows
curved calmly above her eXpressionless
eyes. Her teeth showed occasionally in
sick little smile, and after awhile she had
quite an interesting expression in her
eyes. 1t was probably because the direc-
tor had no occasion during the solo parts of
"Olaf Trygvasson" to bring down his baton
with any degree of Impotence. She evil
IDENTIFY could not understand why she had
been called down by the baton and the
Birmingham sOosts had escaped this pub
lie evidence of a directors disapproval.
As for one of the men soloists from Bos-
ton. here is a story about him.
He was sitting in one of the dressing
rooms at the Auditorium and complaining
of a great many things. He was not in
. contented frame of mind and everything
went wrong. He kept growing warmer and
made some uncomplimentary rearks about
the southern weather. The dressing room
finally became so hot that the sweet-voiced
tenor lost control of his temper and pro-
ceeded to break one of the windows, which
he had attempted to open-unsuccessfully.
The audience heard a great crash that
did not come from the orchestra No one
knew what had happened. and no explain
atoms We're given. 1t was simply that
Campanari, with his temper the master.
mad, with one blow of his strong white
hand, knocked an Auditorium window into
the street below.
-o- 'f.s,s'rrL,I4.~