EMMA ALBANI.

Inangahua Times, Volume IV, Issue 16, 16 May 1877, Page 2

EMMA ALBANI.

The '• Ladies Letter from Paris" in the Dunedin Star, contains the following in reference to Albani, the favourite prima donna, who is now taking a leading position, at the London opera houses :— ■** It is a long time since we had a celebrity so popular as Emma Albani. She has literally taken the town by storm, and surpasses ia the welcome extended to her that given to Patti or Nilsson. The public never warmed to the latter in this country; and as for Patti, she suffers from the reputation of being grubbing on tbe subject of money matters, and has, in additipn, a Bonapartist husband, However, Albani, Nilsson, Patti, Frezzolini, are all chords of the same lyre, whose respective tones we do not discuss, but listen to all, while being charmed with i each. Three years ago Emma Albani

was a bird of passage at Paris, whose voice lacked culture and practice, but contained all the conditions of excellence, and she now returns with professional delects remedied, -rod predictions realised. She is so modest, too : ' her salons are crowded with the most distinguished per--sonages, who desire to render homage to her talent, and she recpives the admirers with most unaffected simplicity. Her distinctive characteristic is not beauty* but grace ; she has all the physical qualities for the stage, and sings and acts while remaining ever true to herself. It is this absence of art9— of professional coquetry that make her friends. The ladies remark her exquisite taste in toilettes ; nothing faulty under the heads of shades and fit, and all worn with that quiet ease indicative of^ the trne elegante. Dinners are given in her honour, and the most costiy bouquets are presented to her at the theatre. Soon she will require a phaeton to carry heme her corbeilles of roses and violets. Her singing in • Lucia di Lammermoor * has according to the best judges, never been" surpassed. The Pall Mall Gazette, referring to Albani's success in Par's this s?ason, says :—■" We can but rejoice to hear all this of the Canadian girl who only four or five years ego arrived In Europe friendless and unknown ; having no encourage' ment, but ejnfid?nc3 in the possesspn of power wlieh required only study and hard work to giin success. _ She worked on ; obliged, mean white, to sing in publio in order to provide means for jnst ruction. It must be very pleasant now to look back on those years of resolute perseverance under difficulties." ■*■______■____■—>