I believe that is the way I do. I don't feel conscious of my body, nor mv voice, in any strong, impassioned scene. In the vocal working-out' we touch upon another art-music. The melody of speech should have more attention than it receives in this country. It is to me a fascinating study." 'How long have you been reading in public?" 66 66 There are certain things better suited for a man than for a woman, and vice versa. A man's cutting of ' Macbeth' or 'The Merchant of Venice' would differ materially from a woman's arrangement, though both should keep the parts vital to the development of the principal theme and characters, and hold all in due proportion. To cut a play, however, should never mean to lop off this or that scene which it may not suit you to handle. It means reducing the whole, as a whole, to lesser dimensions. In arranging Cyrano de Bergerac' there were many brilliant lines and many charming episodes it cost me sorely to give up. I was governed by the relative value of the parts." "How do you proceed to prepare a play essentially serious-minded. after the arrangement is made?" 'About four years, although I began my studies twelve or fifteen years ago. I was teaching literature, and I felt the need of special training to vitalize the masterpieces-to make my pupils feel their beauties as I did. Gradually my work extended beyond the school-room into the larger world." "The composition I work out in terms of painting, i. e., the whole. drama, the acts, the scenes, the separate characters take definite form in my mind as I brood over them—this figure central here those others grouped as secondary and of third. importance. The gestures are largely intuitive. They come with the emotion. Out of these promptings of nature the artist selects; he prunes and modifies. In the cutting one does not need many brush strokes to get the effect, but each stroke should be laid on with a sure hand, in a definite place, for a definite purpose. Then those selected gestures are rehearsed until they, in turn, become reflex action, a part of the character assumed. "But outside of educational circles, is there any field for this serious work which you seem to care for specially?" "Yes; I think more of a field than ever before. The numberless studyclubs all over the country have done much to create a demand for this work. 'Serious' does not necessarily mean 'dull.' The Anglo-Saxon races are We Americans are a thinking people. Isn't that gorgeous?' the instant you. turn to the Eve of St. Agnes,' the beautiful woman in the red gown on the other wall. There is, of course, the demand-the larger audience-for the lighter programs, which are purely for entertainment. I present these sometimes, too, and enjoy them." everything in her devotion to his ambition. It is for him that her brain acts, for him that she forgets her sex, to satisfy his ambition she works, for his protection she takes all the precautions she does. But does she believe she can brush away remorse from her heart as easily as she wipes the blood stain from her hand? Not so. The gasps of fear that escape from her breast, like the last rattle on a death-bed, all the conse quences of the crime prove that the assurance and boldness with which she would inspire her husband are not in her own heart. When the foul deed is accomplished, and the guilty pair are at the great banquet, she does the honors with infinite grace In its construction, "Macbeth" bears a striking resemblance to the trilogy of Eschylus, which includes "Agamemnon," the "Coëphores," and the "Eumenides," a trilogy, which recites in three distinct acts a history of the house of Agamemnon. In "Macbeth" also there are three acts, or "actions," distinct one from the other, and separated by long intervals of time the murder of King Duncan, the death of Banquo, and the downfall of Macbeth. The first shows how he came to power, the second how he WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE IN AMERICA. 'HIS eminent London vocal teach TH er, whose visit to us is the present sensation in the New York vocal world, declares that the art of singing reached its highest point at the middle and end of the last century, but since then, owing to the development of instrumental and orchestral music, it has been comparatively neglected. There is no longer a school of composers who write especially for the voice, although the human voice will, when properly used, never cease to be the most beautiful of instruments. Mr. Shakespeare is a pupil of the elder Lamperti, and, like his master, makes much of the breath in vocal culture. According to him, the two principal signs of correct singing are: (1) that very little breath is used in producing a note, and (2) that the action of the larynx should be automatic and unconscious. With proper breath-control there is freedom of tongue and of other organs, and there is a sensation as if the voice came floating out on the breath. Wrong voice-production, on the other hand, brings with it a constricting of the throat, an embarrass ing of the tongue so that the vowel and consonantal sounds can not be clearly produced, and the perverted action manifests itself in rigid lips and cheeks and in protruding eyes. The jaw also becomes rigid, and the singer is unable to produce artistic tones. Mr. Shakespeare maintains that in singing the jaw should be entirely independent of the movements of the tongue, and that it would be "possible to learn to sing merely by producing the voice with the jaw absolutely loose combined with a right breath-control." The smiling expression during singing is an excellent way to bring the various muscles concerned in the vocal act into right adjustment for freedom of action. The eye is the mirror of the voice, and a person is singing rightly if the eye conveys the intended expression. To quote Mr. Shakespeare's words, "Every emotion of the mind has an appropriate facial expression. As long as the face remains inanimate, so long will the sound of the voice be dull and monotonous; whereas vivacity of the features is invariably accompanied by life and brightness in the tone of the voice. the dramatic stage the expression of ardent love is desired, but through absence of vocal skill the face becomes fixed, the result reaches the ear as vehemence and anger rather than as affection." Whenever on has aroused. It is difficult for a teacher to adapt himself to new surroundings, especially when in the new surroundings will be critics on the alert to discover any defects either in theory or in practice. When at home, Mr. Shakespeare's foreign pupils are those who seek him out because they have full faith in him, whereas, in this country, which he visits for the first time Mr. Shakespeare may be considered as the last prominent exponent of the old method of teaching singing. He THE DRAMA Ο 66 NCE Mr. Daly advertised “A New Representation of Meg Merrilies." For days people wondered how the old story would be made a new one. While going out of the theatre after the performance, the writer heard a girl say to her escort: "It was perfectly lovely and I've had such a good time. So exciting, too. Not a bit like the book." This was inclined to make lovers of Scott grieve, and, by a similar example of public enthusiasm over " Ben-Hur," those who for years have read and reread General Wallace's novel, finding always a fresh charm and witchery in it, were disappointed in the drama as pictured forth at the Broadway Theatre last month. The chief beauties of the story are imaginative. It suggests much, and the scenes which are definitely descriptive are written in such a manner that the mind of the reader leaps forward from them into visions which may or may not be true. No scenic artist can portray that night whose "stillness was more than silence;" that "holy hush as though heaven was stooping low to whisper some good thing to the listening earth." No actress can be Iras. Did not Isis kiss her on the heart when she was a child? Is she not in our thoughts as she was in those of BenHur? "There was simply an impression made upon him; and like strong light, it was a sensation, not a thing of light or enumeration. Thy lips are like a thread of scarlet; thy temples are like a piece of pomegranate within thy locks. Lo! the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of the birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in the land -such was the impression she made upon him, translated into words." Iras is as indefinable as is the perfume which Cleopatra used, and to endeavor to portray her elusive fascination by any arts known to the nineteenth century woman is to destroy absolutely that mystery which is the basis of her power. Sheik Ilderim, too, with the ardor of the East in his speech, and the intense passion of the desert in his loves and hates, cannot be impersonated. The hero himself, Judah, Prince of the House of Hur, like many a hero of real life, loses his greatness when one becomes too intimately acquainted with his natural shortcomings, and it is a shock to your nerves to discover that when for years you have been picturing Messala as a Roman god, he may have been only an ordinary young man with an extraordinary smile. And then the chariot race, which, though often read aloud in a way to make the hearer cringe, has also, when given by great interpreters, flashed before you until the ivory flinders of the broken car fly out over the course, and the superb, delicately built horses rush past the goal, winners. There is perhaps no other |