A Great Vocalist Shows that Only Years of Labor Can Win the Heights of
Song.
OF the five internationally famous singers—Melba, Calvé, Nordica, Eames
and Lehmann—none is a greater favorite than Madame Lillian Nordica. She
has had honors heaped upon her in every music-loving country, including
her own, America. Milan, St. Petersburg, Paris, London, and New York
in turn accepted her, and the music-lovers of those cities received
her with a _furore_ of praise. Jewel cases filled with bracelets,
necklaces, tiaras and diadems of gold and precious stones, attest the
unaffected sincerity of her admirers in all the great music-centers of
the world. She enjoys, in addition, the distinction of being one of the
first two American women to attain to international fame as a singer in
grand opera. When Madame Nordica was in New York fulfilling her part in
the most brilliant operatic season the city had ever known, she lived
in sumptuous style at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, where I met her by
appointment. She accepted the statement that the public is interested
in the details of her career as most natural, and was pleased to
discuss the philosophy of a singer’s success from the view-point of its
difficulties.
“You would like to know how distinction in the field of art is earned?
Well, it is not thrust upon anyone. The material for a great voice may
be born in a person—it is, in fact—but the making of it into a great
voice is a work of the most laborious character.”
“Is the matter of nationality of any advantage to an aspirant?”
“You wish to know——”
“Whether, in some countries, the atmosphere is not very favorable to a
beginner;—the feeling of the public and the general support given to
music not particularly conducive to the musical development of, we will
say, a young girl with a promising voice.”
“Yes. I should judge almost any of the greater European nations
would be better in this respect than the United States; not much
better, however, because nearly all depends on strength of character,
determination, and the will to work. If a girl has these, she will rise
as high, in the end, anywhere; perhaps not so quickly in some places,
but no less surely.”
“You had no European advantages?”
“None whatever.”
“Were you born in the West?”
“No. I come of New England stock. You will understand that more
readily when I tell you that my real name is Norton. I was born at
Farmington, Maine, and was reared in Boston.”
“Were your parents musically talented?”
“Not at all. Their opinion of music was that it is an airy, inviting
art of the devil, used to tempt men’s feet to stray from the solemn
path of right. They believed music, as a vocation, to be nearly as
reprehensible as a stage career, and for the latter they had no
tolerance whatever. I must be just, though, and own that they did
make an exception in the case of church music, else I should never
have received the slightest encouragement in my aspirations. They
considered music in churches to be permissible—even laudable. So, when
I displayed some ability as a singer, I was allowed to use it in behalf
of religion, and I did. I joined the church choir and sang hymns about
the house almost constantly.”
“You had a natural bent for singing.”
“Yes, but I needed a world of training. I had no conception of what
work lies ahead of anyone who contemplates singing perfectly. All I
knew was that I could sing, and that I would win my way with my voice
if I could.”
“How did you accomplish it?”