Hall of song: The 'Met,' 1883-1966; 1909

The following program was produced for national educational radio under a grant from the National Home Library Foundation by W. B U R Boston. Boston University radio presents Hall of song the story of the Metropolitan Opera from 1893 to 1966 was. Cool. You're cool world. Your posts are my own past and Deek music critic of The New York Tribune. And Milton Cross.

With the tenor of Caruso Stacho dominating the stage of the Metropolitan. There didn't seem to be much room left for anyone else and certainly not another marvelously gifted Turner. But it soon turned out that there was another tenor about who could hold his own on any stage even competing with Caruso. The proof was presented on November 17 1990 when Neo slaves act made his impressive metropolitan debut as a tell oh it was an impersonation up soon to be forgotten rotate he cray be in the Tribune one of the amazing things about slaves act for a singer of that period in the metropolitan history was his ability to sing the great roles in German French and Italian operas instead of being limited to one specific area of the operatic literature while the slaves act was able to follow his father's career at the Metropolitan very closely because the whole family was together during the four years that for ten I was in New York hearing is now with some of the incidents he

recalls. Just like when your father came over to America to make his metropolitan debut in 99 and I knew when the whole roast of your family I guess came to us these were the last days of the Metropolitan. They still had money then. See and I remember whole retinue was my father my mother my sister myself our governess cook the personal maid of my mother and mother's and then the companies of my father with his wife. And I think we had four cats and three dogs and canary birds and I had a frog with me I mean it was quite a lot of those days. Season of the metropolitan was really just practically the entire year a singer would be engaged for rather than with a jet back and forth and do maybe two weeks and then Rob somewhere else. Yes I think it was a more restful speed of living had for 20 or 25 performances with and let's see

12 of 14 weeks. But during this time you were listed at the old hotel and someone yeah we had a whole floor and there was some other thing as living there too when I remember. If you could find out how the other colleagues are without going to the Met Your brothers debut was alone of course was one of those very great part. What were your reactions as a young child seeing your father and one light which he did receive of course. Well of course I heard him practice at home so at Becky I was in the understudy of breaking all the parts and my father liked to have me around because he said A child cannot be narky elated with grand opera soon early enough. And I'm very grateful that he did and my father was very wise in the way he guided my musical education because when I saw an opera as I did not know. Also later on when I was to 11 12 and 13 he had a company is coming from the opera and

play the opera for me and he said then explain to me not only the story and the musical phrases he pointed out special beautiful phrases and the repetition of phrases like invite you know you have them the motifs and he also explained to me. Watch out he had an orchestration is beautiful this and he gave me little points on which to hook my mind. We do enjoy. Were you present at a lot of the performances you gave in the audience or backstage. Oh yes yes. My mother was and we always had a box and she took she took me and my sister very very much with us. Well your father was somewhat more diversified than a lot of the singers at that time as you were mentioning we were talking before this. But in those days there were really three companies at the Met and Italian French and a German one whereas your father spanned all three probably centering mostly in

German but doing no not necessarily saying all day long but I thought it. And a talent company and then of course you sing Faust in the French company and Meister and some of the light rain that you see my father was never really like Marion 10. He never sang the ring he'd never seen pacified. Dan has a long and why about the limits he wanted to go as my friend when he started out in Breslau he saying you create and then was that Myla brought him to live in opera. And first thing he did he took all of a canary and rolls away from him he said if you keep this up in 10 years you won't have a voice in the meetings and I need to put genie in Mozart and he said now for the next two or three years you will sing these in these parts. Then in about four years he will be able to see the law and he led him he developed him. Today nobody takes that interest. If somebody has 12 good strong high notes they make him sing about a little care whether in two or three years he's

finished. Now they they squeeze them out and pump them up and then they're thrown away. And through this trainee my father beat was really a lyric tenor who also had the tremendous power to be able to sing out there. Which was my hot hot rolls and he was a great leader seen of course which you know did he work very hard with his support. Yes it was not something that came naturally to him by any means and I don't think it doesn't come naturally but every any great artist I know that every phrase was worked out he knew exactly when the breath should be taken. And then over over all the span of the performance the high points it went it was a very you see the choreography in an opera singers is just as important as the sing. They have very often have to move to music if they move against the music the whole thing looks glamorous. In terms of acting general your father did a lot more than some of those who are content

to just saying that let the rest go by the board. Well I tell you first of all he led the singer's life. He did not smoke and he is when he's saying he never went to smoky places he never drank very much he lacked at last I've been as a father he never drank much mind. And he lived actually for his voice and I remember the great fear in our family was always that Bob Barr might catch a cold. So he was terribly conscientious of course he came from the greatest training ground Gustav Mahler given up who brought the Vienna Opera to the heights of which reputation they're still living. What was life like with a great Turner father. Well I would tell you that since I was very small there was only one one person in the house a whole arm around whom everything revolved it must be a part and these way saying we tiptoe through the house because he was nervous and

he had an early lunch and then he laid down until four o'clock and the idea that you would just be loud was just impossible in the morning at 9 o'clock the companies came in then 11 o'clock. There was no telephone nothing. But he he was very tyrannical in that sense. I was going to. Oh yes yes yes but I mean that's we accepted it because this was a part and he was besides a being tyrannical a very wonderful warm person and took interest in us. Though in the years that he was at the Met there was another tenor of great renown too namely Caruso singing you are how do they get on together because they were more or less neck and neck there. I think in terms of artistic quality. What about the public appeal across cruiser was probably the name. Yes Carrie of course had been at the Met for three or four or five years before my

father came save as much my status did but back again and I remember after my father's first performance one of the papers wrote because I was a beware your rival his family arrived and of course Rosa was not at all jealous and he my father very great friends I have quite a lot of letters which he exchanged which covers over to my father. But that whole clique around career was all he liked too. To protect their I know it's actor hangers on a fraction that Frank Sinatra or Dean Martin is also kind of a gang you know and of course they were wherever they could do something mean and nasty to any other ten oh also to a woman who took the limelight away they thought they would ingratiate themselves with her was if they did that which was very much against that it was pretty much a cutthroat business in those days even more so but no I think I think it was as you mentioned if the French company had a flop the German and Italian companies they used to be very

happy and go out and celebrate and same went for the German companies and for the talent. Each one had a set of conductors and my father really was one of the few who. Who had his feet in every three companies are in competition with the same part. No no no because I'm sure that if there was a would have wanted to sing a part he would have had the preference. Right. I know that my father never sang lead relief at the Met because that was chiros us Barden was one of your greatest parts he said with Vienna studied. Of course long after your father left the Met never again in Godey's regime was the autoload on again. No it was not I think the first one saying Otello was Matthew nailing. And of course I think later on Cairo's all tried Otello but it was a little too heavy My father had at a more dramatic quality than car was ahead there as I was a little more on the

lyric side. Glasgow Rosas Vice had a quality of just just unbelievable. Did you hear him very often because I heard him and if I have back I think every recording is ever made. What was your reaction to him as a child listening. Well as a child. He was the great big singer. Nothing is going to follow. Well he was physically all UniFi has no effect in my book which you just mentioned there is this wonderful character at York I thought that the money where Carol was I was very small and looks up nastily at my father my father has two huge big and looks down angrily have chiros up but that was a joke of chiros. They got along very well and. He was pretty wonderful of course I was too small to really know him personally. Talking about a father size I guess we should mention that he was what six feet seven inches tall. That's one of the great high points of his was in the final act when he used to

chase writers all across the stage and then pick her up bodily and carry it back to the bed. That's a touch you don't get much nowadays. No and his method was a difficult that's because he had very flowing robes which she wore ended in a thing like this are very difficult the family the flowing robes will fall of its face. And then he landed a dark history and then the prompter's box and I think once he fell of the prompter's box I think it was in Germany and it took four people to get him out and get stuck in there. And one says Otello he lived himself in his great jealousy and sorrow fall into one of the chairs and it collapsed under him. When he got up he had like arrow sticking Venetian pieces of wood out of it. Customs was to be a great problem for him. Well he had all these costumes made in Paris. They were designed for him and they were very very valuable and there was a great investment of course my mother was taking care of that every style every rhinestone every jewel was wrapped in

cotton. And it was so that you know when we first came to America I think my mother spent five or six hours Brackley Hall day at the Custom because they thought we were trying to smuggle in and see and they had a jeweler there who looked at every single stone. To find out and made note of it that the when we left on the country again and that's not what either of your father's colleagues Do you remember of course you saying with so many of the greats of that era Scotty and from Star gods. But of course I remember Scott the end is measured the same with him Adelaide and my wife mislay say. She said as she started singing and she studied with Best Buy them out of which was a mast that long before we knew each other but she's given the deputy took me five years and three children to break of the habit of singing because you cannot have a happy married life if I may to an opera singer. I just know it's impossible to even

fighting just doesn't work. How long generally would it take your father to learn a part. Well I don't know not very long it was very musical he learned very fast but after after knowing it and then to work it out so he was always in complete authority he had always enough breath for every phrase and breath left over because you know with the excitement you give more breath than you do otherwise. And it's quite a quite a study and of course my mother always said they're with him when he started and she was he is he was at his conscience. So I was like his career was really a family over the beginning to end the absolutely. What were your recollections or impressions were other of the Metropolitan itself the house. Well my first impression was a terrible disgrace. My father saying I mean oh and of course I knew that a snake is pursuing him in the beginning and Binny came out I stood up in the

box said I shall watch opera the snake the snake and I was taken out of the box and taken to the ladies room had to be ashamed. Never again. No. Otherwise you know it's such a wonderful house. I hate to see it go through all these memories. I've been in America now for the last 30 years and whenever I had I was not playing on Broadway I went. So up every show every performance every opera they gave me if I would have sold a dress rehearsal then of course I lived up or all of my child had been an inhibited Abra child myself thank God I didn't have a voice. Did your a father try to guide you along those lines. When I started singing at home in the bath tub and there was always a knock at the door and the maid came and said because this lady your father say should please shut up. And that kind of stifled it. And one day I went out and I made the recording.

I think the guys at Salem had Capello without an OK strain but I headed for him he was played back to me I decided this is not what I should do. It was loud but it was none not beautiful. It is my fate it is very very rare that a voice is being inherited sometimes that it skips two generations. Maybe I don't think my children have seen boys but maybe their children were not the only case in recent years I think has been used to be willing to know his son. So I have not heard him and I don't know I of course I don't I haven't heard him I don't know how much goodwill there is in the ears of the people who hear him because you see Browning was one of the rare rare rare beautiful voices what a wonderful scene. A great loss when he died. Well your father left the Metropolitan when he was really at the very height of his career. I was just a question of just good judgment on his part wanting to leave when he was at the top or

you know the war broke out. Our 1914 you know the row broke out and then he didn't come back and after the war there was always great talk that he should come back but then he was going to be an opera. And my father was known as one who has saved his money so he didn't need it. And he had had the Met. And he was much more comfortable living in Vienna. And so the only time he came back was nine thousand thirty eight. He visited me I was playing to have a stimulating there. I married an angel by Rodgers and Hart and he came to New York and visited me and it was very exciting. We had we had the Met opened up and he put up all the lights for him and he explained to me where our box was which of course I had forgotten and then he showed me where his dressing room was and where he hit his head on the wall because he had swallowed a quarter of a note where one day he picked him up and lifted him up to his face and kissed him and set him down again. Destiny nearly went out of his mind

was so furious we were going to see the two of them came over. God he brought me and your father about the same time. I think his first performance at the Love Bug was just going on me. And they also brought over good stuff because of my love wasn't very happy there. I think my father sync with him at the Met and then of course 9/11 he died. Now of course. Well you don't think yourself a singer in recent years. Myself and no one knows. Now the one thing that you have to have as a singing voice. Which has been proven at the minute because I have done a gypsy gypsy Baron a part of Japan and I understand I was one of the loudest but not one of the prettiest.

One thing I noticed when you were doing that upper news came out with you know the program before. And amidst all the other saying it was listed as. Tenor from the New York baritone from one place or another and there were you listed as comedian. Well I gave an interview to Time magazine and they asked me what kind of advice I had and I said I'm a bastard Barry 10. That is the best we do this crowd of us Mr Bean was very nice he gave me the rest you know my father said and that was on the ladies side because you know the tenor dressing room we have to climb up 14 stairs and my father hated to climb stairs. And so he asked for one of the ground level and the only one was on the lady's side. So I was also on the lady's side dressing between ridge and Regina Resnick and Lee said Aleck a hazard. We were also debating with wasn't there yet. And I must say that I am sure that since the day my father was in it not much has been done in the way

every decorating. There were cobwebs of 1911 in the corners and it was very cosy. A lot of singers that you were performing with or react to having you on the stage with them was there any resentment or. Joseph Oh I think it was a great case of being patronising you know and rightly so quite rightly said in a very funny film I mean the orchestra. They then had a few instrumentalist who used to be in Vienna and seeing that my father had died for the first rehearsal they all came up and said hello or greeted me and then I could see their interest and their curiosity. Just before I opened my mouth the thing and when the first note came out that horrible look of dismay. That's such sounds could come out of a sleaze attack. But thank God I never had the pretension you know and that's the sad

if you have the pretensions and then you get that look of dismay. How does the general atmosphere of the Met compare. No and in the days your father was singing of course he was in the Golden Age and that included a lot more than just singers and performances was actually a whole way of operatic life wouldn't you say. Yes it was different of course as that is a thing that I cannot judge because then of course I was not in on and daily life of her has love the maid I know that when I was at the Met at one season there was not a ladies room. There was not a toilet where there was no head. But it didn't have a piano where doing the deed was being or was used for hassles. You know the rooms at the Old Met a very very scarce and in every every hallway in Sherry's at the club. Everywhere we had rehearsals and every part had to be covered three or four times so the singers and Sopranos and whatever they were they had to sit around

and watch while the first cast the first company rehearsed. But. I personally have great admiration for Mr being I'm not trying to butter him up because the chances that he will ever have me again are a very remote but to round that monkey cage as well as he does you know with all these little egos and all this little temperaments and all these little stars the big stars of the simplest You know but the little stuff. Oh my God. It really takes something and he has a wonderful aloof personality. He can say I don't know but that his personality can be a very aloof very quiet he has excellent manners. Before every performance he will knock at your door with evening. How are you. If you were to make a joke that. But I found it very pleasant.

It must be a tremendous job I don't think there's any like it in the world. If wonderful ad tell you that sound we had I think 92 people in the orchestra when I did Gypsy back when there suddenly comes out with Lion stuff and acting at least like us as I said feel good about and it was wonderful. You don't have any ideas of trying it again at all. No I would know as what you know after I did the gypsy band. Geraldine Ferraro wrote a letter to Francis Robinson suggested I should sing Beck misstep and Francis Robinson sent this letter to my dressing room and he wrote. Being says no I wouldn't have the voice of a big mess. But I tell you of course being Mr. Bean would never know that he wouldn't have had to pay me I would have paid him just to walk across that stage. That was one of the greatest thrills of my life. When the credit went up to stand in that house that glorious glorious house and

just to be there it was wonderful. It was it was an experience that I would not like to miss and which I'm really proud of and looking back. That was the great Leo of cos. Not Walter in a

selection for my ideas like profit and opera which he sang with great distinction during his years at the Metropolitan. Well on our program next week we'll look at some of the continuing events of the gutter because for no this is Milton Cross on behalf of Myles custom Deek inviting you to join us again there in. Boston University Radio has presented Hall of songs the story of the Metropolitan Opera from 1883 to 966 the series is created and produced by Richard Calhoun a grant from the National Home Library Foundation has made possible the production of these

programs for national educational radio. This is the national educational radio network.