New-York tribune., 1908-08-09

bev gave six performances, in all Of which Nine.
Patti appeared. the operas being La Traviata-
.'Sernrarlide'' Faust" Carmen Lucia and
Marta" The financial results were phenomenal.
The public paid nearly $4,000 for the six operas!
Had Colonel Mapleson been able to do 80 per cent
Of such business the Academy of Music might have
been saved. But Mr.. Abbey. to the slang OF
the stage playing Patti a sensation
Prices Of admission abnormal, and
the audience. Fashion heard Patti at the Metro
politan and did suburban folk. who came to so
opera in business coats bonnets and shawis. Such
audiences were in the theatre before or
since.
This a little Italian opera season, but a, sue
cessfu one and housed at the Metropolitan.
In the fall there had been another the Academy
Of Music which not success and which ended
quarrel between prfma donna and manager
that contributed a significant item to the popular
knowledge of the status of Italian opera. On Oc-
tober Is Italian named Angelo began a season
Of italian opera ct the Academy. The Of the
company was the Angelo Grand Italian opera
Company, and its managers experience had been
made as an underng Of Maplcson in the luggage
department. The season. projected, was TO last
five weeks and virtue proclaimed in the list to
be a departure from the hurdy-gurdy list which
had been doing service long. There were smiles
among the knowing that a trunk dispatcher should
appear as the successor of his former employer.
and that employer polished Of the world
Is James II. Mapleson; but opera makes strange
bedfeIlovs and there have been stranger things
than this in its history A Hebrew boy named
Pohl N;s little more than d bootblack when he
entered the service OF Maurice Strakosch, but
Herr Pollini a couple of decades later he
partner Of that elegant gentleman and experienced
in. .presario and IF the operate dictators of
Germany Eventually in the case of the Angelo
Grand Italian Opera Company il turned out that
the Deus CT rrachinc the prima donna, Gtra-
liza Valda Miss Julia Wheelockl. American
singer who had chosen this means OF getting
hearing in her native land. The list of operas
sounded like an echo Of half a century before: Five
operas were given. and four Of them were by
Verdi 'Isusa Miller Il Lombardi,' TN Ballo
in Maschera' and 4 due Foscari''; the remaining
opera was Petrellas lone" Here was
cape from the threadbare list with a vengeance.
1t made the critics rub their eyes and wonder IL
Nine Valda had been in the company OF the
Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. Five weeks were pro-
jected but trouble came at the end Of a fortnight
that is say. it to public notice at the end
OF fortnight; it began probably with the sea-
On November 3 the persons who came 10
hear promised performance Of La Juive' found
efforts 10 galvanze the corpse into the semblance
the doors Of the Academy closed. A few spasmodic
Of life We're made, but in vain: the Angelo Grand
Italinn Opera Company dead. Some OF its
members had been heard before In other organiza-
eions: some were heard later. They Giralia
valda. Nile, Prand. Nine. vclerga. Mile. Correre.
Mathilde Ricci. Nine. Mestress. Nine Bianchi-Mon-
taldo signor Vicini. Ialloni, Bologna, Greco, Clan
mini. Pinto, Corsi. Migliara and Cont. The con-
whom was discovered as young conductor OF
surprising merit twenty years later by Boston.
One season Of the American Opera Company
sufficed TO involve IL in such financial difficulties
that its managers deemed reorganization neces-
sary. II appeared. therefore. in the season OF
1861 under the title National Opera Company.
Mr Theodore Thomas still It's director
and Mr. Gustav Hinrichs and Arthur Nees as
sistant conductors: Charles E. Locke was the busi-
ness manager. The company spent the greater
part OF the in other cities, but gave two
series of representations in Brooklyn. Acad-
eny OF Music and cne series at the Metropolitan
Opera House The first Brooklyn season was Of
one week from December q 20 January /, when
the German company was idle: the second
hraced the Thursday evenings from February rs to
March 26 during which period the company gave a
regular series Of representations in New York.
Among the singers were Pauline LAllemand.
Emma Juch. Laura Moore. Mathilde Phillips isis
Of Adelaide Phillips. of the singers Of hrst
rank sent out into the world by America). Jessie