The San Francisco call., 1910-03-14
HOLLAND SINGER
CHARMS HEARERS
TiIIy KOenen Renders Remark
able Program at Garrick
Theater
By WALTER ANTHONY

ers. Dutch is so full of consonants
and looks so formidable that you doubt
that the modest and infrequent vowel
is ever heard at all in the cocophony
of explosive syllables. How could one
ever sing whose native tongue stiffens
to the task of such a line as this:
Wat loopen re stiff. wat zein ze toch
bleekr' 1t would not seem possible.
But if we have cherished delusion
so fond and foolish it has been because
we have not heard Tilly Koenen. the
Dutch contralto, who faced an Ameri-
can audience yesterday afternoon of
such diminished and shrunken dimen-
sions as to suggest that it is we who
lack musical APPRECIATION and not the
Dutch.A
With great good humor the singer
smiled on her audience, almost individ-
ually, as much as to say, Wait until L
turn these persons into press agents!
Which she did in her first song; and
into shouting enthusiasts with her last.
In spite of all we had read and
heard about Tilly Koenen we were not
willing to hear for ourselves and pay
money for a concert while vaudeville,
musical comedy, Viennese operetta and
legitimate drama made bids for con-
sideration. Therefore was the Garrick
theater yesterday afternoon nearly
deserted by the throng. 1t is
prophecy as certain of realization as
it is easy TO make that next Thursday
night when she sings again the Gar
rick will be crowded, for Miss Koenen
is more than a feminine Doctor Wull-
ner," as she has often been styled.
She, if you please, is TIlly koenen,
singer, by gifts patent from her maker;
poetess by instinct and sympathy, and
actress temperamentally. But-and this
is not true of Doctor Wullner-with
whom the wise are fond of lkening
her-she is primarily a singer.
Is INTENSE Artistic
She is the most intense artistic
have ever heard in song. 1t is racial
gift, this direct singleness of purpose;
this quality of spirit which focuses
emotion at point burning with
steady, vivid fire.
She is one of the most intellectual
artists 1 have heard, and so appeals at
once to the mind and to the soul. No
man or woman provided with the
song literature of the world from
which to select could conceive better
program than Tilly Koenen sang yes
terday 1t hit the heart and mind at
every point where faculty is exposed to
the touch of beauty and romance
1 have said that she is an actress
That implies merely her ability to con-
vey to her hearers by pantomime the
thought her song expresses. In this
particular she has no equal among the
women singers of the world-at least
none has appeared here that measures
TO the shoulder of Tilly Koenen's his
trionism.
To sum up her qualities Of singing
artist. She has a glorious voice, big
and round and free; she is an emotion
alist, who never forgets that music s
first appeal is to the heart; she is
equipped mentally with fine powers of
discernment and ina gination, and she
is an actress competent to persuade her
hearers of the verify of poetry and
song.
Bernard Tabbernal, the accompanist,
is modest, secure, tasteful and yet in
dividual in his important part of Miss
Koenen's song recitals. If fault
were to be found it is that in such a
song as Strauss Die Wasser Rose" he
does not insist quite vigorously
enough that the beauties of the piano
score be recognized and enjoyed.
REMARKABLE PROGRAM
The program, indicating the finest
cathoIicity, was so full of interest that
the reviewer is bewildered in the at
tempt 10 select one as better than an
other. They were like pearls on a
string.
Do you know that mad mans song.
die Zigeunerin." by Hugo Wolfe
Its wierd and uncanny story of the
waiting lover, and the mirthless
laugh which jars its poetic meter,
stamp 1t as unusual verse for any
composer to take for musical treat
ment. Tilly Koenen's presentation of
If GfervyOrk in the p1nrbiI
Her understanding of its allegory was
perfect. II reminded me of Poe's lines
from the poem in 'The Fall of the
House of Usher:
While. like rapid CHASTITY river
Through the pale door,
hideous throng rush out forever
And laugh, but smile more.
She sang the song superbly and
shudderingly. Nobody wanted her to
do it over again.
1t was followed by another Wolf
song, 'Er lists" 1t was a iubilant
message of spring, soaring like lark
UPWARD and fine with youthful fire.
The singer showed in these two songs
alone the encompassing reach of her
sympathy and spirit The latter song
was the final offering, only the
audience wouldn't go at all, but
clapped and stamped and shouted
Bravo" in five different languages.
Never nave L neaTQ SO small q crOW4
make so great a noise
I wish 1 might speak of her lovely
Dutch songs of childhood, and the
mock air of seriousness with which
she sang them; or her Schubert songs,
or her Brahms or her Strauss; but
there isn't time nor space. If you are
wise and love music, you will hear
them yourself and will not thank any
body for trying to convey to you even
a small Scran of the full <ya
which Tiliy Koenen will convey in her
snnerh art