MUSICAL COURIER
12
May 10, 1923
for that reason is always pure and true in quality. It has power—force—and the pianissimo tones have the same gorgeous quality as his heavier work, proving enviable breath control and pointing of tone. Gorgeous best describes the vocal quality,” wrote Florence Reed in the Los Angeles Express and again after a performance of Trovatore: “Bonelli received an ovation and it was genuine acknowledgment of his art.”
The Los Angeles Times said of a performance of Pagli-acci:
“Bonelli as Tonio won a tremendous ovation in the well-known prologue. It is safe to say that probably no other single aria number given during these two weeks was so entirely satisfactory to everyone. For Bonelli is one of the best singers that the San Carlo Opera Company has ever presented.”
The Los Angeles Record, in commenting on this appearance, declared: “Richard Bonelli’s creation of Tonio was the finest artistic stroke of the present operatic season. His singing was superb and he was dictator of his audience. His singing of the prologue which stopped the show and compelled a partial repetition was indicative of the artistry which lived through all his lines.”
In San Francisco Ray Brown wrote in the Chronicle after his_ first appearance: “His voice is one of firm and vibrant timbre, warm color and rounded tone. He employs it with equal surety in lyric contabile or forceful dramatic urgency and his intonation is always accurate. It is a voice pleasing in its easy and equable flow, its smoothness of phrasing, its excellently graduated volume and its quality of radiant warmth. Richard Bonelli is a singer for whom one can predict with certainty a steady advancement, for he not only has an excellent equipment but directs it intelligently as well.”
The San Francisco Bulletin agreed: “Rigoletto was well notable for its jester done by Richard Bonelli, so well as to stand in high relief together with the numbers of distinguished artists who have made history in the role. His voice is a virile baritone throughout its range, and he has mastered the art of shading its tones to convey emotion. It is more potent than dramatic action to make clear the processes of his mind, the feelings of his heart.”
״ Redfern Mason in the San Francisco called his voice: “Rich-hued with tones of emotional expressiveness. The audience, a critical one, signified their approbation in a fashion that must have done the artist’s heart good.”
Mr. and Mrs. David Honor Utard
Mr. and Mrs. Ross David recently gave a reception and musicale in their studios in honor of Genevieve Utard, the talented daughter of Emile Utard, a prominent member of New York’s French colony. Miss Utard has just completed a bust of Mr. David—a remarkable likeness, life size, and full of character and strength—and this was shown for the first time.
S.°me of the David artist pupils delighted with music during the afternoon. Pauline Hurban, soprano, presented a group of Bohemian songs in the original tongue, and Mary ^ Rowe Davis, contralto, was heard in three of Mrs. David s׳ songs. Mrs. Owen Yoigt, soprano, sang a group of English songs, one of which she accompanied delightfully. Priscilla Baynes, coloratura soprano, gave pleasure in songs and the waltz from Romeo and Juliet. Mostyn Jones, tenor, was represented by Welsh songs sung in his native tongue, and Harry C. Browne, baritone, whom Mr David introduced as the Rev. Gilchrist as h־e is playing the title role in The Fool, sang Scotch and English ballads with great charm. Mr. David opened the program with a. group of favorites, Mrs. David accompanying at the piano Among the guests were many prominent in social and artistic cmcles, and honors and best wishes were extended to Narcissa Gellatly, one of Mr. David’s pupils, who was to be married the following week to Samuel Chamberlain, whose exquisite drawings of France are to be seen in the best magazines of the day.
Grace Stevenson Plays at Hotel Astor
. On Easter Sunday night, April 1, Grace Stevenson, harpist, played a group of Tnst melodies and other pieces at the annual celebration of the Clanna Gael at the Astor Hotel. Her audience was a large one, and received her with great enthusiasm, recalling her again and again for encores. The Caelic American said of her : “A unique item on the program and one for procuring which Chairman McLoughlin was highly complimented, was the selection of Irish melodies played on the harp by Grace M. Stevenson, of Washington a young lady who has been hailed by the critics as one mu..Peat“• hvi?f exponents of that difficult instrument, vr• c. c״tlcf did go out of their way in commending Miss Stevenson s performances on Ireland’s traditional instrument is readily conceded by those who had the pleasure of being enthralled by her soul-touching playing of the lament for the passing of hçr instrument from the long-vanished halls of Tara. The hope was expressed that Miss Stevenson will often be induced to add to the enjoyment of Irish entertainments.”
.'״!SSr-?teV?1SOrn ,hasLbeen engaged to play every Sunday at the Church of the Beloved Disciple, at morning and vesper services.
Future Plans for Shura Cherkassky
Shura Cherkassky, the eleven-year-old piano prodigy from Russia, continues to arouse interest among musicians and music lovers of Baltimore. It appears that his talent was discovered by Frederick R. Huber, municipal director of music in Baltimore, and he is taking a great interest in the boys future. For the coming year the entire musical activities of Shura will be in the hands of Mr. Huber who states that he will not permit the young pianist to play in. concert more than twice a month. The boy’s instruction will remain exclusively in the hands of his mother, formerly a teacher at Petrograd Conservatory, and the painstaking guide who is responsible solely for Shura’s remarkable tech-mc. The time not spent in practice and in preparation for these few concerts will be spent in cultural education and play, so that Shura will grow into normal manhood.
Squires Engaged for Minneapolis Symphony
Marjorie Squires, the contralto, has been engaged as solo-lst ™ the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra in St. Paul and Minneapolis on two consecutive days next fall.
honor was bestowed upon him when he was chosen from all other Italian singing masters to be a delegate at the First International Congress of Phonetics at Hamburg.
Mr. Silva was appointed to fill Cotogni’s place at the Royal Academy of St. Cecelia upon that teacher’s death in 1917 and he still retains the honorary position of Maestro di Canto there.
Today he is known as one of the most brilliant and deeply versed of living vocal, teachers. _ His treatise, Singing and Its Rational Teaching, published in 1912, contributed largely to his fame.
Nathan Fryer is another well known member of the institute faculty for the summer session. He studied for five years with the famous Leschetizky of Vienna, supplemented by special work with great masters in Berlin, Paris, and London. Mr. Fryer has appeared frequently in concert both here and abroad.
Still another pianist of note who will be on the faculty is Beryl ]Rubinstein, who appeared five times last year as a soloist with the Cleveland Orchestra, once with the Detroit Orchestra, not to mention joint recitals with Victor de Gomez and Andre de Ribaupierre. Mr. Rubinstein is known both as a composer and pianist and has written works in many forms.
Prominent on the vocal faculty is Edna Dunham Willard. Her background consists of study with Fuchs, von Fielitz, Kraus, and Knupfer; recital appearances with Mottl in Munich; several American concerts, and five years on the vocal faculty of Peabody Conservatory from where she came to the institute in 1921.
Others enrolled on the summer session faculty are: Louise Langland, Ruth M. Edwards, Emma Banks, Charlotte de Muth Williams, Frances Bolton Kortheuer, Ruth H. Willian, Roger Sessions and Dorothy K. Price. M. B. S.
Bonelli Wins New Laurels on Pacific Coast
Since joining the San Carlo Opera Company as guest artist_ last fall, the career of Richard Bonelli has recorded a series of triumphs. The young American baritone is now
Announcement of Cleveland Institute’s Summer Session
The Cleveland, Ohio, Institute of Music will start upon its second summer session June 21. Last year the six weeks’ session was an experiment. This year it is an assured undertaking based on last year’s success.
Previously, students who wished to pursue their musical studies during the summer had no opportunity to do so in Cleveland. _ The institute felt it was filling a definite need in establishing its summer courses, therefore.
The aim of the institute, generally speaking, is to discover and develop talent, devise the best methods of instruction, and to contribute towards the progress of musical education in the United States. The institute proposes to bring the ׳best methods of musical appreciation to all people from the most ambitious to the most humble. The number of scholarship students would prove this fact, if nothing else.
Plans for this second summer session have taken definite form. Courses have been outlined and a particularly able faculty chosen by Ernest Bloch, musical director of the institute. Mr. Bloch selected his faculty not only for technical brilliance of performance, but also for the more solid qualities of musicality, experience, and the teaching gift.
The outstanding member of this faculty this summer will be Giulio Silva, the distinguished voice teacher. Mr. Silva will give a nine weeks’ course which will begin June 1, three weeks before the regular summer session opens. He was on the faculty last summer also and has been a guest-teacher during the season.
Mr. Silva has been in this country since 1920. He was persuaded to come to America by David Mannes of the David Mannes Music School in New York, where he has been teaching ever since.
Mr. Silva enjoys an international reputation. He was born at Parma, Italy, in 1875, took his diploma in composition at the Lyceum of St. Cecelia’s Academy, and then assisted Antonio Cotogni in his lessons. Later Mr. Silva directed opera performances in Italy and for nine years he taught singing in France and Germany.
In 1913 he was given a life professorship at the Royal Conservatory of Parma, and one year later still further
RICHARD BONELLI
at the Curran, San Francisco.
a prominent member of the special company Gallo has assembled for the gala season of opera in Havana. The follow-Ing excerpts from enthusiastic comments of San Francisco and Los Angeles critics show that he won the same outstanding success on the Pacific Coast as achieved by him throughout the East:
“Rigoletto was given last night with Richard Bonelli, baritone, creating a sensation. Mr. Bonelli possesses a voice of rich resonance which flows through under the laws of superb relaxation. His tone is faultlessly poised and־
GUNSTER
Captivates Corning
"The soloist could not have been more happily chosen. He was Mr. Frederick Gunster. If there is a single thing lacking in the performance of that personable and amiable young tenor he has effectually concealed that lack of art with art more subtle. Mr. Gunster has taken his work seriously and that attitude is' rewarding him by threatening to make him one of art’s favorites. He has a rare dramatic and sympathetic presence, phrasing, diction and enunciation, and a range of correct tone production that seems the more impossible because he goeth, iike the wind on an aeolian harp, where he listeth. And all with an engaging smile and a lack of visible effort with ease that is only rivaled by his simulation of great reserve volume under perfect breathing control. His is a really trained voice made at will to become both a telling dramatic medium and an instrument of emotion.”
(Evening Leader, Corning, N. Y..
Apl. 19, 1923)
MANAGEMENT ! HAENSEL & JONES AEOLIAN HALL	NEW YORK
THE INTERNATIONAL SOPRANO
»(ÍíqÍÍü.Jtfefuip
RALPH ANGELL, Pianist■
“THE DEVIL INVENTOR”
(“VELNIAS-ISRADEJAS”J
Lithuanian Opera in 3 Acts, will be performed with a Symphony Orchestra at the Broadway Theater, South Boston, Mass.,
Sunday, May 20, at 2:15 Under the personal supervision of
MIKAS PETRAUSKAS
The composer of this opera