THE SEASON WITH LUCCA
After the London season and before returning to America we went to
Switzerland for a brief holiday. During this little trip there occurred
a pleasing and somewhat quaint incident. On the Gruenewald Glacier we met
a young Italian-Swiss mountaineer who earned his living by making echoes
from the crags with a big horn and by the national art of yodeling.
There was one particular echo which was the pride of the region and, the
day we were exploring the glacier, he did not call it forth as well as
usual. Although he tried several times, we could distinguish very little
echo. Finally, acting on a sudden impulse, I stood up in our carriage
and yodeled for him, ending with a long trill. The high, pure air
exhilarated me and made me feel that I could do absolutely anything in
the world with my voice, and I actually struck one or two of the highest
and strongest notes that I ever sang in my life and one of the best
trills. The echoes came rippling back to us with wonderful effect.
The young mountaineer took off his Tyrolean hat and bowed to me deeply.
"Ah, mademoiselle!" he said, "if I could call into being such an echo,
my fortune here would be made!"
Our stay there was all too short to please me and the day soon came for
us to start for home. We crossed on the _Cuba_ of the Cunard Line, and
a very poor steamer she was. It was not in the least an interesting
trip. There was no social intercourse, because all the passengers were
too seasick to talk or even to listen. It seemed to them like a personal
affront for anyone not to succumb to _mal de mer_.
"You mean thing," one woman said to me, "why aren't you seasick!"
Our passenger list was, however, a somewhat striking one. Rubenstein and
Wieniawski were on board and Clara Doria; Mark Smith, the actor; Edmund
Yeats and Maddox, the editor whom I had known in London, and, of course,
Pauline Lucca. She was registered as the Baroness von Raden and had her
baby with her--the one generally believed to have a royal father--and,
with her baby and her seasickness, was very much occupied. Her father
and mother accompanied her. Lucca, as we know, had been a ballerina. Her
toes were all twisted and deformed by her early years of dancing. She
once showed them to me, a pitiful record of the triumphs of a ballet
dancer. There was something of the ballerina in her temperament, also,
which she never entirely outgrew. Certainly she was far from being a
_prima donna_ type. An irresistible sense of fun made her a most amusing
companion; and her charm lay largely in her unexpectedness. One never
could guess what she was going to do or say next. I recall an incident
that occurred a little later in Chicago that illustrates this. A very
handsome music critic--I will not mention his name--came behind the
scenes one night to see us. He was a grave young man, with a brown beard
and beautiful eyes, and his appearance gave a vague sense of familiarity
as if we had seen it in some well-known picture. Yet I could not place
the resemblance. Lucca stood off at a little distance studying him
owlishly for a minute or two as he was chatting to me in the wings.
Presently she whisked up to him with her brown eyes dancing and, looking
up at him in the drollest way, said laughingly:
"And how do you do, my Jesus Christ!"
On this voyage home I saw more or less of Edmund Yeats who kept us
amused with a steady flow of witty talk and who kept up an equally
steady flow of brandy and soda, and of Maddox who was not seasick and
was willing to both walk and talk. Maddox was an interesting man, with
many strange stories to tell of things and people famous and well-known.
Among other personalities we discussed Adelaide Neilson, whose real
name, by the way, was Mary Ann Rogers. I was speaking of her refinement
and pretty manners on the stage, her gracious and yet unassuming fashion
of accepting applause, and her general air of good breeding, when Maddox
told me, to my great astonishment, that this was more remarkable than I
could possibly imagine since the charming actress had come from the most
disadvantageous beginnings. She had, in fact, led a life that is
generally characterised as "unfortunate" and it was while she was in
this life that Maddox first met her, and, finding the girl full of
ambition and aspirations toward something higher, had put her in the way
of cultivating herself and her talents. These facts as told me by Maddox
have always remained in my mind, not in the least to Neilson's
discredit, but quite the reverse, for they only make her charming and
artistic achievements all the more admirable. I have always enjoyed
watching her. She was always just diffident enough without being
self-conscious. It used to be pretty to see her from a box where I could
look at her behind the scenes compose herself before taking a curtain
call. She would slip into the mood of the part that she had just been
playing and that she wished still to suggest to the audience. Which
reminds me that Henry Irving once told me that he and Miss Terry did
exactly this same thing. "We always try to keep within the picture even
after the act is over," he said. "An actor should never take his call in
his own character, but always in that which he has been personating."
On the whole the particular trip of which I am now speaking stands out
dominantly in my memory because of Rubenstein. I never, never saw anyone
so seasick, nor anyone so completely depressed by the fact. Poor
creature! He swore, faintly, that he would never cross the ocean again
even to get home! Occasionally he would talk feebly, but his spirit was
completely broken. I have not the faintest idea what Rubenstein was like
when he was not seasick. He may have sparkled consummately in a normal
condition; but he did not sparkle on the _Cuba_.
The Lucca-Kellogg season which followed was not a comfortable one, but
it netted us large receipts. The work was arduous, the operas heavy, and
the management was up to its ears in contentions and jealousies. New
York was in a musical fever during the early seventies. We were just
finding out how to be musical and it was a great and pleasurable
excitement. We were pioneers, and enjoyed it, and were happy in not
being hide-bound by traditions as were the older countries, because we
had none. One of the season's sensations was Senorita Sanz, a Spanish
contralto, whose voice was not unlike that of Adelaide Phillips. She was
a beautiful woman and a good actress, and, above all, she had the true
Spanish temperament, languid, exotic and yet fiery. Her Azucena was a
fine performance; and she created a tremendous _furore_ with La Paloma,
which was then a novelty. She used to sing it at Sunday night concerts
and set the audiences wild with:
[Illustration: Musical notation; Cuan-do...... sa-li de lo Ha-ba-na
Val-ga-me Dios!]
Lucca's operas for the season were _Faust_, _Traviata_, _L'Africaine_,
_Fra Diavolo_ and _La Figlia del Regimento_. Mine were _Trovatore_,
_Traviata_, _Crispano_, _Linda_ and _Martha_, and _Don Giovanni_. It was
to Lucca's _Zerlina_ that I first sang Donna Anna in _Don Giovanni_;
and, as in the big concert at the Coliseum my friends had felt some
doubts as to the carrying power of my voice, so now many persons
expected the _role_ to be too heavy for me. But I believe I succeeded in
proving the contrary. When we did _Le Nozze di Figaro_, Lucca was the
Cherubino, making the quaintest looking of boys and much resembling one
of Raphael's cherubs in his painting of the _Sistine Madonna_.
Personally, the relations between Lucca and myself were always amicable
enough; but we had certain professional frictions, brought about,
indeed, by Jarrett who, although he was nothing but an agent and an
indifferent one at that, was generally regarded as an authority, and
gave out critiques to the newspapers. It so happened that, without my
knowledge, the monopoly of singing in _Faust_ was in her contract and I
was so prevented from singing Marguerite once during our entire
engagement. As Marguerite was my _role_ pre-eminently, by right of
conquest, in America, I felt very hurt and angry about the matter and,
at first, wanted to resign from the company, but, of course, was talked
out of that attitude. Jarrett would not, however, consent to my even
alternating with Lucca in the part; but possibly he was wise in this as
Marguerite was never one of her best personations. She played a very
impulsive and un-German Gretchen, in spite of herself, being an Austrian
by birth. One of the newspapers said that "she fell in love with Faust
at first sight and the Devil was a useless article!" Her
characterisation of the part was somewhat devilish in itself; her work
was striking, effective, and _piquant_, but not touched by much
distinction. The difference between our presentations was said to be
that I "convinced by a refined perfection of detail" and Lucca by more
vivid qualities. Indeed, our voices and methods were so dissimilar that
we never felt any personal rivalry, whatever the critics said to the
contrary. As one man justly expressed it: "Neither Lucca nor Kellogg has
the talent for quarrelling." There were, of course, rival factions in
our public. A man one night sent a note behind the scenes to me
containing this message: "Poor Kellogg! you have no chance at all with
Lucca!" Two days later Mme. Lucca came to me laughing and said that some
one had asked her: "How do you dare to sing on the same bill with Miss
Kellogg, the American favourite?"
[Illustration: =Newspaper Print of the Kellogg-Lucca Season=
Drawn by Jos. Keppler]
So interesting did our supposed rivalry become, however, as to excite
considerable newspaper comment. In reply to one of these in _The Chicago
Tribune_ a contributor answered:
_To the Editor of The Chicago Tribune_:
SIR: In your issue of this morning, there is an editorial headed
"Operatic Failure," which is, in some respects, so unjust and
one-sided as to call for an immediate protest against its
injustice. Having taken your ideas from _The New York Herald_, and
having no other source of information, it is not to be wondered at
that you should fall into error. For reasons best known to Mr.
James Gordon Bennett, _The New York Herald_, since the commencement
of the Jarrett-Maretzek season, has undertaken to write up Madame
Lucca at the expense of every other artist connected with the
troupe; and it is because of _The Herald's_ fulsome laudations of
Lucca, and its outrageously untruthful criticisms of Kellogg, that
much of the trouble has occurred. Of the two ladies, Kellogg is by
far the superior singer. Lucca has much dramatic force, but, in
musical culture, is not equal to her sister artist, and there is no
jealousy on the part of either lady of the other. The facts are
these: The management, taking their cue from _The Herald_, and
being afraid of the power of Mr. Bennett, tried to shelve Kellogg,
and the result has been that the dear public would not permit the
injustice, and they, the managers, as well as _The Herald_, are
amazed and angered at the result of their dirty work.
OPERA.
Chicago, Oct. 28, 1872.
Lucca and I gave _Mignon_ that season together, she playing the part of
Mignon and I that of Felina, the cat. Mignon was always a favourite part
of my own, a sympathetic _role_ filled with poetry and sentiment. When I
first studied it, I most carefully read _Wilhelm Meister_, upon which it
is founded. Regarding the part of Felina, I have often wondered that
people have never been more perceptive than they appear to have been of
the analogy between her name and her qualities, for she has all of the
characteristics of the feline species. Our dual star bill in the opera
was highly successful and effective in spite of Jarrett's continual
attacks upon me through the press and in every way open to him. He did
me a particularly cruel turn about Felina. I started off in the _role_,
the opening night, in what I still believe to have been the correct
interpretation. _Wilhelm Meister_ was set in a finicky period and its
characters wore white wigs and minced about in their actions. My part
was all comedy and the gestures should have been little and dainty and
somewhat constrained. So I played it, until I saw this criticism,
written by one of Jarrett's creatures, "Miss Kellogg has no freedom of
movement in the _role_ of Felina, etc."
My mother, always anxious for me to profit by criticism that might have
value, said that perhaps the man was right. At any rate, between the
two, I became so self-conscious that the next time I sang Felina I could
not get into the mood of it at all. Not to seem restricted in gesture, I
waved my arms as if I were in _Norma_; and the performance was a very
poor one in consequence. Yet, in spite of Jarrett's machinations, it was
said of me in the press of the day:
" ...Her rendering of Felina was a magnificent success. From the first
scene on the balcony until her light-hearted laughter dies away, she is
a vision of beauty and grace, appealing to every high aesthetic emotion
and charming all hearts with her sweetness."
[Illustration: =Clara Louise Kellogg in _Mignon_=
From a photograph by Mora]
Furthermore, an eminent Shakespearean critic, writing then, said:
As an actress, Miss Kellogg's superiority cannot justly be
questioned. Some things are exquisitely represented by the fair
Swede, Miss Nilsson, such as the dazed look, the stupefaction
caused by a great shock, like that of the death of Valentin, for
instance; such as the madness to which the distracting conflict of
many selfish feelings and passions leads. But she is always
circumscribed by her own consciousness. Her soul never passes
beyond that limit--never surrounds her--filling the stage and
infecting the audience with a magnetic atmosphere which is a part
of herself, or herself transfused, if such expressions be
allowable. In this respect Miss Kellogg is very different and
greatly superior. Her sympathies are large. She conceives well the
effects of the warmer and more generous passions upon the person
who feels them. She can, by the force of her imagination, abandon
herself to these influences, and, by her artistic skill, give them
apt expression. She can cease to be self-conscious, and feel but
the fictitious consciousness of the personage whom she represents,
while the force of her own illusion magnetises her auditors till
they respond like well-tuned harps to every chord of feeling which
she strikes.
Such notices, such critiques, were compensations! Taken as a whole,
Felina was a successful part for me; largely on account of that piece of
glittering generalities, the Polonaise. In this, according to one
critic, "she aroused the admiration of her auditors to a condition that
was really a tempestuous _furore_." So, as I say, there were
compensations for Jarrett's unkindnesses.