Dewey County advocate. [volume] (Timber Lake, S.D.) 1910-1913, 1913-03-21
ROMANO DISRuPTS AN OPERA COMPANY
Musical Circles Of Two Continents Thrown Into Turmoil and Arts
tocras Of Vienna in Merry War Over Love Afar-Ends in
Marriage in New York Of Prima Donna and Conductor

AvEW YORK.-A romance which
disrupted an imperial opera
III company, started war among
the aristocrats of Vienna and
for three years kept the musical cir
cles of two continents in general tur-
moil, ended the other day with a
quiet little marriage in the city hall
One of the participants was Lucille
Wasself, Harlem girl, who, under
the stage name of Lucille Marcel, is
known as one of the worlds great
prima donnas; the other was Felix
Weingartner, the famous conductor.
The two met four years ago when
Marcel, then virtually unknown, was
selected by Richard Strauss to Gre
ate the title role in that most diff
cult opera, "Elektra." Weingartner
was conducting the Imperial opera
company at Vienna, where the first
production of the new opera was to
be given. He was married at the
time to Baroness Fedora Won Dreifus,
an intimate friend of the Archduchess
Marie Valerie, Francis Joseph's young
er daughter. These high connections
made the love affair which followed
an event of extraordinary public in
terest. In a few months the entire
aristocracy of Vienna was talking
about it.
Marcel resented certain criticisms
from court circles and, despite an
opera public which adored her, an
grily resigned from the imperial COM
pany. Weingartner followed suit. The
imperial orchestra went to pieces.
The imperial public went mad. All
over Europe musicians laughed at the
discontinue of the archduchess and
her friend, rejoicing meanwhile at the
independence of their fellow art
lists.
All this because Mrs. Samuel e.
Wasself of 961 Columbus avenue, Har-
lem, became convinced IL years ago
that her daughter could sing!
There were five members of the
Wasself family-Lucille, two brothers
and two sisters. They lived over
their fathers drug store on Colum-
bus avenue. Lucille was the only
one who had a voice. Every one ex-
cept her mother considered 1t sad
but undeserved affection. Mrs. Was
self. through some mysterious facul-
ty that had been denied the rest OF
the family, perceived that 1t contain
ed extraordinary qualities. AS soon
as Lucille had graduated from the
Eighty-ninth street grammar school.
an event which ,transpired in 1900, her
mother took her to Paris to study.
She was a little girl, beautiful then
as she is now. Her beauty, after four
years, gained her position in the
Opera Comique, which paid her a sal
ary of $50 a month, not a great
amount. to be sure, but sufficient to re-
store the failing finances of mother
and daughter. But she did not stay
at the Opera Comique long. One night
Jean de Reszke, the opera tenor.
whose chief delight Is the develop
ment of new voices for the grand op-
era stage, heard her rendition OF a
little chanson. He visited her the
next day and told her that she would
have to give up the Opera Comique
and become his pupil. For another
four years Lucille studied under the
great man. Then, in 1909, came the
chance of her lifetime. Richard
Strauss. desperate at his failure to
obtain a prima donna of sufficient W.
tally, voice and dramatic ability to
create the difficult role of Elektra,
begged de Reszke to help him.