isa-normaladvance-1909-00206

Description:	206THE NORMAL ADVANCEI heard The World and His Wife, withFaversham and Julia Opp, What EveryWoman Knows, with Maude Adams, TheEasiest Way, with Frances Starr, This Manand This Woman, with Carlotta Nihlsson, andA Womans Way, with Grace George, oneafter the other. They are all of them Womenplays. The Frances Starr and the CarlottaNihlsson plays have no excuse for being, but theothers are all worthy and they all hinge uponvital questions that are essentially feminine.Dramas are—it seems, keeping pace with theSuffragette and Gist movements here andelsewhere. And speaking of the Suffragettesreminds me that a few weeks since, I went to anopen air meeting of the Suffragettes in Brooklyn as the guest of Mrs. Breithut, wife of Prof.Breithut of the City College of New York. Mrs.Breithut was one of the speakers, as was alsoMrs. Alma Webster-Powell, soprano of theRoyal Opera in Berlin for three years, and nowon Mr. Hammersteins list for next year. Therewas also Mrs. Wells who has been jailed somany times in London for disturbing Parliament. She is a modest appearing little woman,very bright, very brainy. I met all the speakers, (there were six) and was asked by Mrs.Powell to tell what I knew about the inequalityof pay for men and women teachers. Mrs.Powell has meetings at her home every twoweeks, in her splendid auditorium, where shegives dramas and operas for her own satisfaction and amusement—and that of her friends.She laughingly explained that I would be aGist not a Jette because I would talk in ahouse instead of under the sky, as she had done.I did not speak for her, but sang instead, andwas rewarded by the bestowal of a new namefor my voice. It has been so variously named,that I thought the list was exhausted. WhenI studied with Chas. Adams in Boston, myvoice was a dramatic soprano. It changed intoa mezzo-contralto when Saenger of New Yorktook charge of it, and later in Karelton Hack-etts hands in Chicago it was a lyric soprano,while Mr. and Mrs. Toedt declare it to be anS. P. Contralto. But Mrs. Powell said it wasundoubtedly a dramatic soprano with very darkcoloring. Great minds will differ, etc.Referring again to dramas, I believe that theone that our Indiana Booth Tarkingtoh helpedto write, ranks up to the I point, as much asany. I refer to The Man From Home, withWilliam Hodge. The Battle, with WiltonLackaye is not far behind. I chased away theblues for weeks with the laughs I had fromThe Traveling Salesman, and The ManFrom Mississippi.This year, there seems to be a play for everymood, and no one need go to a poor one.Through Mr. and Mrs. Beard of ColumbiaUniversity I sang at a big Socialist meeting oneevening and met quite a number who are prominently identified with that movement. I wasinterested in meeting Platoun Brunouff, theMusician Socialist, who is a Russian and acomposer of some very beautiful songs. Hemay be better identified if I speak of him asthe teacher of Herbert Witherspoon, one of thesingers for the Artists Course, and now bassoat the Metropolitan Opera House. Had I notdecided to come home early on account of myEuropean trip, I should have sung for himApril 8th, in Cooper Union, the old historichall where Lincoln made his famous speech,—in a concert entirely of his own composition.Through Mr. Brunouff, I met many prominentmusicians.There are two events that stand out in mymemory of the art world. One is the Sorollaexhibit, where every day, 25,000 people saw themarvelous collection for weeks. The other wasa quiet afternoon in the home of the artist whowas chosen by the Pope to repair the walks o_fthe Vatican, because no other person in theworld knows the secret of indestructible muraldecoration, save this one man. The art wasknown B. C, then lost. It was again discovered in the time that Greek art was at its highest stage of development, and then again lost.Again it was known to Michael Angelo andagain it was lost until this New York artist rediscovered it some three years since.On the walls of his rooms are paintings that
Source:	http://indstate.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/isuarchive/id/34236
Collection:	Indiana State University Archives

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