JOHN McCORMACK

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1032, 24 July 1930, Page 16

JOHN McCORMACK

ONCE OFFERED £2 A WEEK A ROYAL COMPLIMENT Knight Commander of the Order of St. Gregory the Great, Knight Commander of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre, Chevalier of the Legion of Honour, Count of the Holy Roman Empire, and the world’s highest-paid concert singer (he is a millionaire) — that epitomises the career and achievements of John McCormack, the most mellifluous tenor of this or any other age (writes a correspondent). Fourth of 11 children, born in Athlone, McCormack was brilliant at school. When he began to sing he went to Dublin to be heard by Charles Manners, of the Moody-Manners Opera Company. Manners, always out for a bargain, was, or professed to be, unimpressed. He offered chorus lead, with the prospect of small parts. Later a friend got John a George Edwardes audition, though, as it happened, the musical comedy chief was abroad at the time. J. A. E. Malone was holding auditions for “A Waltz Dream,” and offered McCormack £2 a week in the chorus. A few months passed the George Edwardes, home and on the look-out for a new tenor, was told by the friend of McCormack’s experience. “I’ll hear him,” said George. “You can hear him tonight if you like,” he was told. “Good; where’s he singing?" “At Covent Garden with Tetrazzini,” was the staggering reply. Count McCormack is fond of telling the story of when he sang before Queen Alexandra in a London drawingroom. The song was, “I Hear You Calling Me,” and the Queen, who was troubled with deafness, listened intently. Queen Alexandra said to him. “I go often to the Albert Hall, and even when the band plays double-forte I scarcely hear, but I heard perfectly even that last pianissimo tone of yours.”

“That,” says McCormack, “is the greatest tribute I have ever had.”

The Museum of Cremona, Stradi varius’s native province, has been presented with a collection of the 'great luthier’s instruments by Giuseppe Flor ini. Signor Florin! purchased the collection, which includes violins and violas in an extraordinary state of preservation, from the Marquis della Vale, having as his chief rival bidder at the sale M. Barrere, the French Ambassador to Home during the war.