13
MUSICAL COURIER
March 1, 1923
SIGRID
Contralto, Metropolitan Opera Co.
In Song Recital
MINNEAPOLIS
{Only first paragraphs
BOSTON
SIGRID ONEGIN DISCOVERED
CHICAGO
SIGRID ONEGIN, GREAT
NEW YORK
MME. ONEGIN CHARMS
of
reviews quoted)
Leaving the University last night after hearing Sigrid Onegin sing, an old German was heard to mutter over and over again:	“Himmel, das war ein
Genuss, das war herrlich, herrlich”; but that only half expresses the supreme satisfaction, the glory of Onegin’s art, voice and personality gave to the most enthusiastic audience that ever greeted an artist in this hall. This woman has the voice of a century, ranging easily through three octaves, capable of expressing every shade of human emotion and without a single discernible flaw. —James Davies, Minneapolis Evening T ribune.
It is perilous to attempt to review a song recital by Sigrid Onegin; those who have heard her will inevitably find any printed words cold and mechanical by contrast with the superb beauty of her singing and the vividness of her oersonality, while those to whom she is as yet only a name are sure to regard the necessary superlatives with suspicion. For there is no other way to write about Mme. Onegin. To call last night’s concert the most genuinely thrilling song recital Minneapolis has heard in many years is to invite dangerous com-oarisons, and yet I can recall no other such recital here in which a great audience was so profoundly stirred, or with such good reason.—H. A. Bellows, Minneapolis Daily News.
Sigrid Onegin brought one of the most astounding voices of the decade to Minneapolis last night, in her recital at the University concert course. Only in superlative terms can one appraise the art of this marvelous contralto. A new ‘‘greatest’׳ voice, it seems, has been added to the roster of America’s songbirds in the person of this Swedish singer. — Royal W. Jimerson, Minneapolis Star.
Sigrid Onegin last night created a unique sensation through her marvelous voice and art in the fourth concert of the university music course at the campus armory. Except upon the occasion of the Lund student choir concert, this building has never witnessed such scenes of overflowing enthusiasm as last night causing the singer to add to her program a whole group of extra songs and arias. From every side were heard throughout the evening exclama-
AND APPLAUDED
A Singer of Voice, a Singer of Temperament, a Singer To Sway Andiences
By every sign known to the chronicle of the concert halls, high word from New York had been this day fulfilled in Boston ears.
Clearly Mme. Onegin’s best possession is her voice. She calls herself a contralto. The lower range, the deeper timbres of her tones, warrant such designation; yet they run as high and as full as any mezzo-soprano’s. These upper tones indeed give her voice individuality, since they are singularly clear, bright and soft, with the resonance that may haunt the poets’ fancy when they write of silver trumpets. Elsewhere Mme. Onegin escapes the thickness, the heaviness, the unwieldiness of tone, often haunting contralto voices. Rich sounds her singing; deep it may go; she may flood it into phrases long sustained; yet never once does it lose this bright resonance. Therein has she, again, a rare, an individualized voice. It is supple, as well at ease and aglow in quickpaced, changeful music, capable even of arabesques and the ornaments of song. In it also dwells a rare propulsive power. She does not drive through her songs after the manner of many a singei similarly large voiced and large tempered. Yet she brings to them a pervading and communicating warmth of recreation. Not a few of her numbers last evening were familiar. Yet from her it was possible to hear them with what actors call “the illusion of the first time.” — M. T. P., Boston Transcript.
She not only has a voice that would charm anything that could listen to it,
but she has also much personal magnetism, besides a dark, impressive beauty of the heroic type. With such equipment did she storm the gates of the Metropolitan. Small wonder that she achieved instant success. And now the concert hall. Same answer. — Zoe Farber, Boston American.
The instant that Sigrid Onegin opened her mouth yesterday evening there was a sensation. Very few contralto voices approach hers in range, quality, resonance. Then there is the personality of the woman, a sumptuous creature, radiating youth and temperament, taking her audience, so to speak, in the palm of her hand, simply enchanting them with her personality and enthusiasm until they were going to applaud no matter what she did. — Olin Downes, Boston Post.
CONTRALTO
An unusual personage came upon the stage of Orchestra Hall last night. She is Sigrid Onegin, contralto, who has been singing this season with the Metropolitan Opera and came here for a song recital. Of all the contralto voices In memory there is none like hers.
I would not attempt to tell offhand how wide her vocal range is, but last night It seemed as though there were no limit to it, either up or down. A glorious voice it is, too, as even through its whole extent as though it were produced by a mechanism instead of a human throat, clear, ingratiating, flexible —one wants to use all the adjectives there are, and hesitates only through fear of extravagance.
What is more to the point, this glorious voice is applied to the purpose of glorious singing. In fact, Mme. Onegin >8 almost unbelievable. She has looks, personality, and a superabundance of vitality. She strides upon the stage—an ordinary walk is too lifeless for her takes her place in front of the piano_ and one is immediately in danger of losing his head, his heart, and his critical faculty. Certainly the old Italian songs of Marcello, T.otti, and Paisiello and the lieder of Schubert and Brahms took on a charm that I hardly suspected before. — Edward Moore, Chicago Tribune.
Sigrid Onegin, this year’s contralto recruit at the Metropolitan Opera House, gave a recital last night in Orchestra Hall before a large and justly enthusiastic audience. Remember her name, absentees, for when she returns to Chicago, and I hope she will, your conscious, voluntary absence would be a crime.
Here is one of the most glorious contralto voices of the generation. I think that it is sufficiently eloquent. Must we add that it has every beauty—warmth, richness, depth, carrying power, sympathy, plasticity, volume, range?
To these natural gifts add that of expressing emotion and sentiment, the stage presence of a Walkyrie, rare musical intelligence, and divine simplicity of manner. I heard her Schubert and Brahms group and two Brahms extras.
But does it matter what she sings?— Herman Devries, Chicago American.
Diva’s Second Recital Proves Her Without Rival On the American Concert Stage
In Carnegie Hall Mme. Onegin gave her second song recital and again her voice and art not only delighted her numerous hearers, but caused them to wonder at the beauty and plenitude of the former and the perfection of the latter. The voice is surely without a peer on the operatic or concert stage of America at this time. At the beginning of her recital yesterday, when she sang familiar Italian airs by Marcello, Paisiello and Lotti, we were a bit troubled by her opulent temperament, for we prefer a classic repose, a purity of melodic line in harmony with the artistic spirit of their time in songs like, “Nel cor piu non mi sento,” and “Pur dicesti,’’ rather to an attempt to give dramatic expression to the text; but in the more modern German and French songs she left no inclination to cavil. It was only to sit, listen, enjoy, marvel, and hope that she will never permit her exuberant feeling to get the better of her artistic instincts. —H. E. Krehbiel, New York Tribune.
The great contralto—one has no hesitancy about the grant of the adjective in her case—was unconstrained, full of what she was doing, and doing something worth while. Her voice had all its splendors of color and power, and the songs she sang were enriched thereby. They were an unusual collection for a recital programme, but to the least interesting among them she gave a touch that held one’s attention, whilst those of genuine beauty became something noble and moving as she delivered them. How much a mistress of fundamentals Mme. Onegin is, she revealed in this recital, for in some of the old airs with which she began it, and later, there occurred necessitous florid graces in the music which she accounted for with ease. Once, indeed, she executed as perfect a trill as one has ever heard from some of the finest of the older adepts at fioriture. One might go through her programme in catalogue fashion and touch song for song with descriptive adjectives, but they would say no more than that she is a singer who invariably fuses lyric and melody into a beautiful piece of vocal expression.— Irving Weil, New York Evening Journal.
tions such as:	“Never have I heard
such a voice,” “Never have I heard or dreamed of such art,” “Never has such singing been heard before.” And many of these absolutely unreserved and unsolicited outbursts coming from people who pride themselves in reserve -or acute critical acumen.—Victor Nilsson, Minneapolis Journal.
CONCERT MANAGEMENT ARTHUR JUDSON
In Conjunction with International Concert Direction, Inc.
FISK BUILDING, NEW YORK	PENNSYLVANIA BUILDING, PHILADELPHIA
Steinway Piano
Mme. Onegin Records Exclusively for Brunswick Records