The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1912-01-20
BRILLIANT RECEPTION
Judge and Mrs. G. r. Amidon Enter
tain Many Friends Last Evening
at Grand Reception.

I -aE#hE
All necessary factors ~concurred in
making the reception given last even
ing by Judge and Mrs. Charles +. Ami
don in honor of Mr.. and Mrs. Walter
L. stockwell, a unique success. The
company Of 800 friends gathered in
stones auditorium at an early hour
and by 9 o'clock the assembly room
presented a brilliant scene of life and
color. The animation and charm char
acteristic Of the affairs given by Judge
and Mrs. Amidon are assured by their
rare feeling for the continuity of the
city's social life. In their gatherings
the newer elements mingle and har-
monte with the older in such a way
that both factors in the social whole
find themselves equally at home. Many
were the Fluctuations to the hosts and
their honor guests upon the suspicious
gathering.
The art-interest of the evening in
hered in the fact that Miss Marie
Sloss, head of the piano department in
the Valley City Normal school and
Mrs. Blanche Boyden Hutchinson,
teacher of expression in the Fargo
conservatory, were presented in re-
cital. ~
This. the first occasion of hearing
Miss Sloss in Fargo, could not have
filled the ample expectations cherished,
more to- overlooking. Her precocious
promise as a girl in Lincoln, Nebr.;
her three years of study in Berlin un-
der the watchful eye of Spencer, have
had a wonderful fulfllment in scope
of interpretative power and control Of
technical problems that gives her con-
~spicuous rank among the masters of
the piano that have heard her. She is
very young, yet in an. exacting pro-
ramm that for a less instructive
musician would have furnished traps
and pitfalls al. every turn, she brought
the feeling of the great trio of COM
posers straight home to her hearers
with poetic fire that thrilled.
Consider the list. The Frederic
Chopin group, covered a number of the
preludes; the c Sharp Minor Waltz
and the Ballade in A. Flat. From
Claude Debussy's works the selections
were a Prelude and a S~arabande. The
programme closed with Franz LISTS
Il aIdlIGitSs III P0AS 1AA01lStoAAohtp nO
such Albanian task has been attempt
ed here and carried to such a triumph
ant termination. Her genius shines in
an intimate sense with the mind of
Chopin, ''the musical genius of the
nineteenth century,"-it responds to the
last modernities of Debussy's disson-
ances that probe the deeps of human
emotion and his harmonies that come
like sunlight singing Ger the sea-
it understands the poison-madness of
LISTS dance. However novel the in
depreciation she may select for a pass
age, once heard it seems In. vitable and
the mind adopts it as being given with
authority. 1t is idle to presage how
far Miss Sloss will travel on the road
of art, but her interpretations given
last evening will remain MS a clip1ac-
teric in the minds OF her Fargo hearers.
Mrs. Hutchinson chose as her NUM-
Der the scene from The School for
Scandal, where Lady Teazle by turns
defies and coaxes her liege lord. The
company followed with alert pleasure
the deft strokes whereby she r~ecreat-
ed the pastel effects OF the Georgian
comedy OF n The surface of
like OSCdul6 ISuSCLSu as III a m1TfOf
Under her skilful handling Of Snerl-
dams Incompatible dialogue ana the
delicacy Of her art was attested
throughout by subtle touches OF char
a~cterization.
1t is a rare distinction to be able
to convey the superficial nature of the
perverse little social climber who had
mounted her coach from the depths
Of q country garden, but Mrs. Hutchin-
son made the part plausible and, in
an old-world sense, human. In the
hearings of this artist that Fargo has
thus far been privileged to have there
is already manifested a wide adaptive
ness and a signal degree % artistic
conscience. 1t is fortunate that the
Opportunity is given on Jan. 80 to
hear her in a recital Of work of such
intensity as Hedda Gabler, which may
reveal fresh potencies in her essen
italy dramatic nature.
The cards for last evening were &
mainly to Fargo and Moorhead
friends: but several people from the
interior of the state were present,
among the number being Miss Fanny
Amidon of Valley City, Mr.. and Mrs.
Clark w. Kelley Of Devils Lake and
Col. Grant Hager.