Full chorus of 1,200. Organ. Grand orchestra of 150. Full military
band, drum corps of the city militia, 50 anvils, 100 firemen, city
fire bells and cannon to be fired from the stand of the leader by use
of electricity.
General Conductor, Mr. R. Herold. Organist, Gustav A. Scott.
These concerts were among the grandest achievements of our time. The
music of the musicians and singers was par excellence and should never
be forgotten as long as history can keep it alive. How vividly is the
scene before me--the magnificent chorus, the pealing of the organ
tones, the excellent performance of the orchestra and the beautiful
playing of Camilla Urso and the enwrapt listeners that crowded the old
pavilion to overflowing. Those were days of music for Californians who
knew how to make it and we should always have the greatest pride in
recounting these magnificent efforts.
In the year 1874, when Madam Anna Bishop was making her American tour,
she included San Francisco, and with her troupe came also Alfred
Wilkie, tenor, and Frank Gilder of New York, an organist and pianist
of high repute. He was a genius in a class of his own. As the Salt
Lake papers said of him, "Frank Gilder, who can snatch more music out
of a piano than Beethoven could write in a week, is with the Lingard
Company and will play a number of solos tonight. He is an entire
orchestra, a sort of a condensed brass band, and those who don't hear
him will never know what pianos were invented for." This was a unique
"ad.", but was just about right. I was employed by him when he
inaugurated his popular twenty-five-cent concerts. He gave thirty-six
in the course and I sang twenty-five times for him. I sang one evening
at one of Madam Bishop's concerts, and after he heard me sing Gatty's
Fair Dove (my ghost song, as he called it) he planned out these
concerts--something out of the ordinary. Each artist received ten
dollars, no matter how high he stood in his calling, or the prices he
received from other managers. That was the order of things and each
one who sang must take that or not sing. We began in the hall of the
Y.M.C.A. on Sutter street. The following artists appeared: Mrs. M.R.
Blake, contralto; M.A. Anderson, tenor; Sig. C. Orlandini, baritone;
Frank Gilder, pianist.
The morning Chronicle had this to say in regard to the first concert:
"FRANK GILDER'S POPULAR CONCERTS
"The first of the series was given in the presence of a large and
fashionable audience. The music was first-class in every respect and
nearly every piece was encored. Gilder's Galop de Concert and
Orlandini's Largo al Factotum most emphatically so. Mrs. Blake
distinguished herself as an accomplished vocalist in Millard's song,
When the Tide Comes In, and in the favorite old Scotch ballad, John
Anderson, My Joe. It was supposed from the low price that these
concerts would be beneath the notice of the high toned dilettanti of
the city, but the performance last evening has completely disabused
not only the nicely-critical, but the public generally of this idea.
The series is to be continued. The second in the course will be given
on Tuesday eve of next week."
[Illustration: Mme. Anna Bishop, beloved instructor of Mrs.
Blake-Alverson and with whom she sang in many concerts.]
The second concert on Tuesday was given with Madam Anna Bishop, Mrs.
M.R. Blake; Cornelius Makin, bass; Prof. von der Mehden, baritone;
Frank Gilder, solo cornetist. With the sixth concert in the Y.M.C.A.
hall we found the hall too small for our audiences, and then went to
Platt's Hall. Not two-thirds of the people could get in. We tried
Pacific Hall, and that did for several times, and then there were
enough people on the outside to fill an ordinary hall. The theaters
were too expensive, so we went on the road. We gave two concerts in
Stockton theater to packed houses; two in Santa Cruz in the pavilion,
with great success; two nights in Vallejo, when every seat was taken,
the gallery packed and faces peeping in at the windows. A laughable
act not on the programme occurred that evening which, I think, Walter
Campbell and myself will never forget. We had a duet in which we
always claimed the house, and this evening when our number came Mr.
Gilder began his quaint Quaker march and Reuben was to come from one
side of the stage and Rachel, on the other, and meet in the center of
the stage like two prim Quakers. I took the steps with Mr. Gilder's
tom tom of quaint chords and I arrived in the front of the stage and
no Walter. I was in dismay and the people began to laugh, especially a
portly individual sitting directly in front of the orchestra. He
thought it was all in the bill; Madam Bishop, in the wings, feared the
performance was ruined. I tried with all my might to keep from
laughing at Mr. Gilder, who was keeping up the incessant march. At
last I turned and saw Walter Campbell standing beside me with a face
like a marble statue, still and pious as the most devout Quaker,
waiting for me to begin, rising and falling on his toes. I began my
song, "Reuben, I have long been thinking, etc." and the song went on,
and between each stanza the applause was deafening and continued until
the last too-ral-loo had died away. We received five recalls. The
paper came out with glowing accounts of the success Walter and I had
won and we were lionized the rest of the season. When we were allowed
to retire, Walter, in his quaint way, said to me, "Susan Jane, you
almost made me laugh. I never went through such an ordeal in all my
singing days. It seemed I was destined to stand there forever before
you began." I think we have laughed over that concert time and time
again. It is one of our best jokes between us when we recount the
enjoyment of our successful concerts given in California, Oregon and
British Columbia.
[Illustration:
Hugo Mansfeldt
J.H. Dohrmann
Sir Henry Heyman
Alfred Wilkie