Famous Singers of To-day and Yesterday

by Henry Charles Lahee

In 1884 Mlle. Nevada had a disagreement with M. Carvalho about a costume. He offered to cancel her contract, and she joyfully accepted the offer, after which they both had ample time to repent of their hasty action. The following year she married Doctor Raymond Palmer, a surgeon practising in the west of England, a big, bluff, handsome Englishman. She was small, slight, and graceful.[{236}]

The marriage, which took place in Paris, in October, 1885, was a great social event in the American colony in Paris. Speeches were made by Consul-General Walker and others. Ambroise Thomas, the composer, was there, and called her "Mignon, my dear interpreter," on which she rose from her seat, went to him, put her arms around his neck, and kissed him. The wedding presents were many and valuable, and the descriptions thereof filled many columns of the newspapers. Never before had an American prima donna been the centre of so much excitement.

After a short honeymoon, a concert tour in the United States was undertaken. Madame Nevada did not retire from the stage, but after fifteen years she is still as popular as ever, though her voice is too light to be effective in any of the grand operas of modern times.

Unquestionably the greatest artist of her[{237}] school on the opera stage at the present day is Emma Calvé, whose proper name is Emma Roquer. She was born in 1866, at Décazeville in the Aveyron, her father being a civil engineer, and a member of a good Spanish family. He unfortunately died when his daughter Emma was sixteen years of age, and left his family in poor circumstances. Emma, who was the eldest child, was brought up in a convent, the quiet life of which was very attractive to her, but she was prevented from taking the veil because her mother needed her help at home.

A gentleman from Paris, who heard her sing one day in the convent chapel, urged her mother to send her to Paris for musical training, and much against her own wishes the young singer began the course of training which led to her appearance on the operatic stage.

Life has not been all sunshine for Emma Calvé. She has acquired her art in the[{238}] school of adversity. Her early stage experiences were not highly successful, though she was reëngaged. Her début was made at Brussels at the Theatre de Monnaie, as Marguerite in "Faust," in 1881. During this season she received a salary of a hundred and forty dollars a month, which was increased the next year to two hundred and forty. In 1884 she went to Paris, where she created the leading part in "Aben Hamet," by Dubois, at the Theatre Italien, and was decidedly successful.

Her teachers up to this time had been a tenor named Puget, and Laborde, but she now began to study under Madame Marchesi, and then followed a successful tour in Italy, during which she gained much by association with the Italian people, and cultivated her dramatic instincts. Here she saw Eleanora Duse, the great actress, whose impersonations made a great impression on the young singer. Calvé's impassioned acting,[{239}] her magnetic personality, and beautiful voice, won for her the greatest success at La Scala. In 1889 she returned to Paris, and continued her career of hard work and success, but the day of her greatness had not yet come.

In 1891 she created the part of Suzel in "L'Amico Fritz," at Rome, an event which added greatly to her renown, and when "Cavalleria Rusticana" was given in Paris for the first time in 1892, Calvé was selected as the most fitting interpreter of the part of Santuzza. Her success in this part was something phenomenal, and was gained after much study of the story, the close intercourse she had made with the Italian people, and by the aid of some suggestions from Mascagni, the composer.

Her success as Santuzza was repeated in London, and, after ten years of unremitting labor, Calvé found herself acknowledged as a great artist. Notwithstanding the excellent[{240}] quality of her voice, and her mastery of technique, her victories have been gained by her dramatic impulses.

Her next triumph was achieved in the character of Carmen. In order to study for this part she went to Spain, where she learned the Spanish dances, associated with the Spanish people, and learned as much as possible of the character of the Spanish peasant.