Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-09-03
STORIES OF MUSIC

about music. and both had "a Washington
end One of the narrstors was an officer
or the navy and the other a newspaper
correspondent stationed here.
Said the newspaper man:
twenty years ago. as a youngster l was
the dramatic and music critic'-sounding
ute that l keenly enjoyed in by boyish-
ness-for newspaper published in ST. Joe,
Mo-
one day received bunch of notices to
the effect that the Milan Grand Italian
Opera Company would give one consec-
utiVe performance at the st. Joe Opera
House. RigOletto' being the opera sched-
uled In these advance notices
Il proceeded of course with all of the
enthusiasm that impelled me in that flown
time, 10 grind out most learned and
lohderous essay upon the opera of 'Rigo-
!etto. so as to make sure that the st. Joe
1oihs would understand something about
what they were listening to and looking
rived.
THE Milan Grand Italian Opera Com
pany. a really credtable. but hard-luck
organization of badly managed Italian
singers. had all sorts of trouble Of its
9 J before .. 1t ever contrived to make st.
Joe. II came near never reaching ST. Joe
az all. for the outfit became stranded in
Kansas City. and the ST: Joe date was. Of
course, Cancelled But the ST. Joe Opera
hao d ADVANCE sale
the RlSoletto date, and when that fact
was wired to the manager of the opera
company he decided to keep the date and
the organization drifted dismally into st.
Joe.
There was a frst-rate house when the
curtain was due to go up, but it soon be-
came obvious that there was something
wrong behind the curtain. l went back to
ma out what the trouble was. The leading
soprano, Signora Rimaldi If correctly
recall her name, had struck for her money,
which was not forthcoming, and had de-
chned to go on until she received at least
piece of it. The manager wouldn't pro-
duce, and so Rimaldi left the opera house
In dudgeon. The second soprano, an Amer
lean young woman, expressed her willing
ness to do the best she could in Lucia,
one OF her favorite roles. and SO the mana
ger announced the substitution of Lucia
for Rigoletto and the performance went
on.
Maybe it was because I was very
young and full of glow and sentiment; but
the Lucia performance seemed entra ncing
to me. The singers, at that were all most
capable artists, and it might have been eX-
pected that they would be thoroughly at
home IN such characteristic Italian opera
as Lucia But 1t took me right off my
feet anyhow. / had never heard that mar
velous sextette from Lucia sung before,
and its almost intolerable beauty affected
me painfully for days.
THE American girl of Italian training
who had VOLUNTEER ed to sing the part of
Lucia acquitted herself with supreme
credit, and carried the house by storm
when the performance was over l rush
ed to the office and scrubbed most splen-
diferous critique of the organizations rem
diton of the opera. More particularly did
1 go into raptures over the singing OF the
American girl. upon whom l showered
yeritable cascade of roses for the sweetness
ard purity of her tones. 1 met her before
she left ST. Joe for ST Louis the next day,
and she rewarded my rapture over her with
her inscribed photograph and a dazzling
smile.
Last winter friend of mine came scut-
Ting along here from Denver, and he ask
ed me to accompany him on a call wh1cn
he was about to make upon pair or clever
women, sisters, whom he had known In an
eastern city a good many years ago.
went along. The sisters were witty ana
accomplished women of forty or that neigh
borhood. They were making ready for a
theater concert when we called, and they
invited us to accompany them to the con-
cert. for which they had extra tickets. we
went.
Zone Ct the orchestral numbers at the
concert was the overture to Lucia Inc
sister next to whom 1 sat appeared to be
strangely moved by that composition.
When the gorgeous sextet was reached l
observed that her eyes filled with tears. l
could not blame her. That Sextet had a
curiously disturbing story of lost youth 10
narrate to me. too.
1--WE walked home from the concert, the
night being starlit and beautiful.
"s"I.ucia' appealed to yOu, | said to my
companion 1t carries me back over haze
of years. too. l heard 1t nobly done as a
lad long before l had begun to tread the
gray desert years and have never for
gotten it, That was in little old St. Joe.
away back yonder in the eighties-twenty
years ago. in truth
Il felt a queer clutch upon my arm. The
clever woman stopped dead, and l saw her
looking into my face.
7
said, in a muff1ed sort of tone, something
of the pathos of the gone years in her
voice You are - and she pronounced
nv name, of the ST. Joe - and then she
mentioned the name of the paper to which
I was attached two decades ago. Your
face has been worrying me all the even
ing 1 should like to show you that clip
ping-your generous criticism of my
Lucia" 1t has been following In the
bottom Of my trunk all these years
.Eheu, and there we were, middle-aged
folks, standing under the starlight in a
surge of sentiment. She was the Ameri-
can girl who had taken Rimaldis place
and caused my heart to ache for days
with the recollection of her Lucia"
Said the naval officer at the musicale:
Attached to the gunboat On which I
complished but excessively modest as
sistant engineer. Among many other
things that he did well he wrote mighty
neat and readable verse. One afternoon.
while the snip was lying III the ndTDOT Oh
Honolulu he sat down in the ward room
and wrote a thing of four or five verses
filled with pretty sentiment that SEEM
ed curiouSly at variance with the taci-
turnity and the decidedly reserved and
diffident manner of the author. The verses
were penned in a rather unusual meter
and had queerly musical Tilt to them.
The engineer was my pal, and he pushed
the verses over to my side of the ward
room table to read. l detected the note
of music in them quickly enough.
There ought to be music set to these
lines Willie 1 said to him--his nickname
aboard ship was Silent Willie on account
Of the long rests he gave his tongue. They
have a ballad-like flow to them.
81 know a fellow in st. Louis who writes
music around verses he replied. L believe
I'll send this doggerel to him.
He did send the verses to the ST. Louis
man, who happened to be then. as he still
is, a very famous composer of high-grade
ballads. When he had mailed the verses
ne promptly forgot all about them.
Eighteen months later Silent Willie and
I were detached from our ships at the same
time and ordered to Washington. We came
up from Honolulu and scooted across the
continent for Washington, just as soon as
we could make it.
"a few nights after we got here my en-
gineer matey and called upon some girls
we knew here. The girls were clever sing
ers and instrumentalsts After the greet