The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-03-22
BY ADELAIDE NORWOOD.

u ADELAIDE NORN OOD.
"The first appearance of the singer
In a new role is something more than
an event in her musical career. 1t is
an epoch, or so it seems to her, in
lyric history
Every trifling circumstance con-
nected with her debut in an unfamiliar
role, takes on an exaggerated impor-
lance that seems to her almost epic.
1T has been my fate to be pursued
each time l sing new roles by ludi
Crous incidents. For instance, when I
made my first appearance as YUM
Yum in The Mikado,' the tenor, who
was cast for the opposite role, was
suddenly stricken with a hoarseneSS
which entirely incapacitated him from
singing. There was no alternate, and
as ii was impossible to change the
bill | was obliged to COO my part into
the ear Of an unhappy little substitute.
whose real mission in the operatic
world was TO drag Unwilling melodies
from the first violin in the orchestra.
The wretched little man was gifted
with a plaintive and tremUlous voice
one Of the kind that the ungodly call
q sOprano-baritone, and he burpled
the lyrics accorded to Nanki-Poo as
those lyrics were certainly never heard
before on the operate stage. The au-
dience evidently thought the young
mans performance a capital joke, but
to the singer himself and to me it was
q tragedy"
"a similar fatality. oddly enough, at
tended my first singing of the role Of
Leonora in III Trovatore' Again the
tenor was placed suddenly hors du
combat, and again an unwilling ana
incompetent substitute sang the princi-
pal male role. The young man thus
pressed into service was so nervous
that the still, small voice with which
n9Tnrp hpd i'm, OH lx,
fled when he stepped before the foot
lights In the tower scene his music
therefore was sung by the robust bari
tone of the company. who did the most
awful things the human ear has ever
heard to Manrice's high Cs in that eel
ebrated duet.
I'm my first appearance in Carmen,
debut which realized a dear and long
cherished dream-a ludicrOus incident
robbed the occasion of the glory with
which [ had fondly believed it would
clothe my young career. AS you prob
ably remember Carmen wears CO.
quettish slippers with heels of exag-
gerated height. She makes her en-
trance on the stage down, q flight Of
steps. Devotion to art-or possibly 1t
was vanity-caused me to persuade
the wardrobe woman to provide me
with a pair Of slippers whose heels
were higher than those ever worn by
any previous Carmen. In one respect
at least l fondly assured myself, my
Carmen will be on higher plane of art
than even that of Calve.'
But. alas. for the vanity of the young
prima donnai AS 1 tripped Tightly
down the stairs at the cue for my first
entrance, one Of those absurd heels
caught on the step and was wrenched
off the shoe. All the vanity possessed
promptly oOzed out Of the other heel,
as L hobbled onto the stage and hmped
through the first act to the undisguised
merriment of the chorus. Between the
acts the heel was replaced by the sym
pathetic wardrobe woman, but when I
did the dance which Carmen executed
Tor Don Jose in the next act, the other
heel became loosened and flew off my
shoe, landing directly on the head of a
venerable gentleman in the front row.
The poor aid man wrote me q letter
the next morning saying he should al
ways retain that scarlet heel as a SOU
Yenir of delightful performance OF
Carmen But so fas as 1 am con-
cerned that delightful performance
of Carmen will always be remem-
bered without the aid of a souvenir"