Confessions of an Opera Singer

by Kathleen Howard

The opera soubrette had one of years' standing with a tall ungainly White Dragoon. He was a harmless idiot, and she a smart German-Polish Jewess, a nice little thing. We each had a "Benefiz" before leaving the Metz engagement, when we were showered with flowers and gifts from our friends and admirers, also sharing in the box-office receipts. R——, the soubrette, told us the day after hers, still breathless from rage, that "Er"—she never called him anything but "He"—had sent her an umbrella, bound in the middle of a huge sheaf of roses. He had not passed it over the footlights, so that every one might see its splendour, but had left it at her rooms. When he called on her expecting soft thanks, she berated him soundly, and succeeded in so enraging his usually placid self that he threw his big sabre through the window, sending it crashing into the court below.

One handsome Red Dragoon, a notorious connoisseur of music and women, and believed absolutely irresistible, always sat in a box at our right from the stage. His one reputable passion was music. He had at that time an affair with a Dutch woman, who had been handsome and distinguée—she was pitifully his slave. Going to the theatre one evening we saw her approaching from one direction in the big court in front of the theatre, as he approached from another. She smiled infatuatedly at him but he passed her without a look—perhaps his idea of a tribute to my sister and me. I felt sorry for her as the joy left her face.

Several years after, while touring in Holland, in a charming little place where we went to pass a free afternoon, we saw this same woman. She had found the strength to shake off her German master, had married a countryman and looked prosperous and happy.

Neither Marjorie nor I ever received an offensive word or look from an officer. They used sometimes to send me postcards after a Carmen or Amneris night, closely scribbled over with signatures and greetings and phrases of admiration, all highly respectful. It always pleased me very much to receive these cards.

The Genossenschaft members of most theatres organize a fête every year for the benefit of their society, and that spring we had a fancy dress ball. A lady is chosen at these balls by popular vote to be Rose Queen. I was chosen that time and had to parade around the room on the arm of a portly Major, who often sent me flowers and books of his own poems. I wore my Carmen dress of black satin, with gold flowers, and my scarlet Spanish shawl. There was much cheap champagne drunk to the popular toast of "General Quenousamong." This was originally "Que nous aimons" (To those we love), and the "general" meant that every one was to join in. The French touch was considered elegant, just as Couzank was the polite word for cousin, and Satank for satin. Balls of this kind are highly popular and a great contrast to the usually simple lives of these small-town people.

One form of simplicity I never adopted was the quite general one of eating their evening supper, consisting usually of a bit of sausage, and black bread and butter, out of bits of paper casually put down amongst the objects on the table in their bedrooms. When you had finished, you simply rolled up and threw away the greasy papers and the thing was over.

Sometimes a meal may be captured free. One of our "comics" in Metz had to fish at the back of the stage in an operetta. He was always furnished with a salt herring by the property man, which he would suspend solemnly out of sight of the audience for a while, then slowly draw up, and proceed to eat. A clean picked spine was all that remained by the end of the act, and he had had his supper.

Often the performances supplied me with welcome comic relief behind the scenes. I learned for instance, that the text of the Anvil chorus sung round me, as I lay on the canvas rock couch of Azucena, in "Trovatore," was: "Ich habe Dir schon laengst gesagt, die Wurst sie schmeckt nach Seife"—"I told you long ago, the sausage tastes of soap." Also the soldiers in "Faust" made their rollicking return from the wars to the words: "He—ring und Apfel—Kartoffelnsalat." "Herring and apple—potato salad." Siegmund grows woefully vulgar, and the opening bars of his love song to his sister always say now to me: "Winter Struempfe riechen im Monat Mai."

Once in "Tiefland" the old man in the first act was presented with a large lump of Limburger cheese, which he had to sniff and hold gratefully for a long time, while his rejoicing colleagues slapped their knees with glee in the wings. Sometimes the humour was replaced by other less agreeable emotions. For my Benefiz, the last year of my engagement, I was to sing Carmen. I wanted a popular guest tenor from a neighbouring Hoftheater to be my José, and he finally agreed to come. He would not come in time for rehearsal and I did not see him until I turn my head in the first recitative and see him making his sword chain. From then on, he directed me in lordly tones throughout the first act. I had often sung Carmen in Metz and the audience knew most of my business and expected it; also as I had prepared the rôle in Paris and spent months of study on it I did not see why all of my business should be changed on my own festive night. Therefore in our short talk before the second act, I told him my positions as nicely as I could, he saying to everything, "Aber warum? Warum?" (But why, why?). I stood this as long as I could and told him all the warums, till finally I said "Because I want to!" At this he lost his temper and left the stage. I was surprised, but supposed he was nervous. From then on, things went from bad to worse. Everything Carmen said to José, he thought Howard was saying to him. I tried to whisper that I meant nothing by it—that that was the way I played it, but he grew blacker and blacker. Finally in the last act I struck him with my fan, my usual business to make José let Carmen pass. He rushed at me and caught my wrists and shouted, "Was faellt Ihnen denn ein" ("What's the matter with you?") I was frightfully upset and nearly crying by then, but had to go on. At the last as I lay on the floor and he stood over me, he deliberately threw his heavy dagger in my face, and I, a corpse, had to move my head to avoid being hurt. He rushed to his dressing room and cried and shouted for a half hour before his wife dared to go in and calm him. I believe it was all jealousy. He had been most popular in the town, and could not bear to share a performance with any one. The next day I could hardly hobble; all my bones seemed wrenched; but every one was most sympathetic and kind.

The bells in Metz were most numerous and depressing. The cathedral near us chimed all day an out-of-tune singsong, which the natives said was, "Ich bin todt und komm' nicht wieder!" ("I am dead and shall not come again!")