THE OPERA.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XL, Issue 191, 3 August 1876, Page 2

THE OPERA.

To the Editor of the 'Evening Mail.' Sib— l have no desire or pretension to lead the musical taste in this town, but I know when I hear music that is worth listening to and I have the keenest desire to hear as much of it as possible. We have n6w had two performances by the Simonsen Company of which the second wag much better that the

flrat for reasons tbat can readily be imagined, but either, and especially the latter, ha*, in my opinion, been better than any other music of a similar class whieh hai been given here since I have been ia Nelson. Last night there were forty- eight persons present, besides a very few iu the gallery. Now, I venture to submit that we are making a very great mistake in this matter. People crowd to look at "jugglers and mountebanks," but to hear the masterpieces of the great composers given in a style with which it is the merest nonsense to compare anything that is usually heard here, to tay nothing of a band \ which to my mind is worth all the money by itself— a pitiful forty-eight is all we can ) muster I We are a musi-al town and fairly well-to-do, and the result is to me very surprising. I should like to know whether any one has ever considered where he could lor 7s 6d get his daughter euch a singing lesson as she would have had could she have heard Madame Simonsen sing " The last Rose of Summer" last night? I know very well that if we maintain onr present apathy in the matter for to-day and to-morrow it will be many a long day ere wp have such a chance again, and so lam writing this letter from the most purely selfish motives, and, in order that there may be no mistake upon this point, I beg to aiga myself Yonrs, &c., Charles Y. Feix. August 3, 1876. ,a "-~ i ' — -■ ». , , -*?-»