Evening star., 1928-11-25
NJ u S &c
BY HELEN FETTER.

HSC OF muSlcaI events Cnal
- should prove a welcome
opportunity for Washingtonian;
to rest their ears a bit. The only
professional concert will be the
song recital to be presented by
Roland Hayes, who has created G
definite place as a leading singer
of worldwide popularity. His ar
tiStry first became evident in the
singing of negro spiritualS. Since
then he has proved equally eff
cient in giving original and ad-
mirable interpretations Of othcg
kinds of songs, including the most
eXscting of the ancient classics.
With this one exception. Wash
ington'S Thanksgiving week will
slide with practically silent har-
mony into history and leave an
open door for a very busy Decem-
Der, speaking nusically. \
x q u *
TWO of WaShington'S three fine
- service bands are safely home
from long tours that have carried
musical values, educational and
purely of entertainment quality,
to many other communities in the
country. One, the United States
Navy Band. is still away, but
heading for Washington with
hopes of eating Thanksgiving tur-
key back iii the good old barracks
at the navy yard. This band
seems to have had more unusual
adventureS-especially with the
natural elements-than either of
the other two. Doubtless because
the Navy Band has ventured
farther North and West. j. A.
Winn, correspondent for the Navy
Band, has written Of how the
musical gobs have had, as side
duties. digging their train from
srowdrifts and other out-of the
ordinary OCCUPATIONS to fill up the
hours when they are not playing
Wagner overtureS and Victor Her
bert specialtieS. Most recently,
Mr.. Winn writes:
''The 1928 tour seems to have
been one of experiences and
there's no predicting what will
happen next. Last Saturday we
were in Coffeyville, Kans.. waiting
for the train to take us to Inde-
pendence, Mo. We haven't seen
that town yet. The Southwestern
floods stopped our train and VIC
were shunted to various lines.
ending up at Sedalia, Mo-, after IA
hours of riding. SedaliS wasn't on
our itinerary, but it was high and
dry and no trains leaving for
either East or West.
"It was rather unusual for the
natives to see so many sailors ma
rooned out in the SagebruSh, and
at every turn we had to explain
our presence. Sunday came and
went, and we were still looking
for a train to make up and get us
out. but no such thing happened
until 5 o'clock Mondav morning.
Concerts in independence, Mo,
and Alton, ILL.,, just had to be can
celed.
Every one in this group is per-
fectly satisfied to be moving East
ward. One of our boys summed
up this garden spot Just about
perfectly. He saws that out here
YOU can see farther and see less
than anywhere else in the world.
Even Washington, Ind, hasn't q
thing in common with its name
sake"
It really looks as though the
placid waters of the Potomac were
going to prove panacea for the
sailor bows out in the great oDen
spaces. The amusing part is that
it was flood waters which got the
musical gobs into such a boat"
WITHIN the past week opera has
been a leading dish in the
musical diet. In the City of
Brotherly Love, where the old
Academy of Music still houses
what is perhaps the most promi-
nent 1--WE were told the only pay
ing one') of three opera COM
panies, and the streets downtown
are even more torn up than in the
National Capital, Leori'S one-act
Chinese opera, "L'Oracle," was
given its first performance for
some time, in conjunction with
the premiere<in America OF Oscar
Wilde's "Salome" as a ballet, with
musical score collected and ar
ranged by Henri Elkan, who con-
Quoted this performance. These
works were discussed more in de-
tail in this column last week. Suf-
flee to say, in this connection, that
the dominant impression of this
opera that fingers was that OF the
remarkably good singing OF the
little Japanese actress who re-
Gently discovered she had voice
of operatic values. There was no
special distinction to the settings
and the chorus was so large and
strictly local that it was quite as
.unwieldy as such choruSeS usually
are.
The next day, in New York, a
very different Chinese opera, also
written by an Italian composer
was witnessed at the Metropolitan
Opera House, in New York, when
the dazzling Viennese beauty,
Maria Jeritza, sang the title role
of Puccini'S "Turandccv." 1t would
be difficult to SurpaSS the mag
nificence of detail, the pictorial
splendor, the costumes and set
tings Of this performance. The
chorus was tremendous in size, but
most of the members were veter-
ans of experience, and their train
ing for grouping, as well as sing
ing. accompanied by excellent
makeup, left nothing to be de-
sired for the stage picture. The
whole opera was sung in Italian
and the huge orchestra, under MIR
Serafin, comulemented the sing
ipC-actorS admirably. Here was