OPERA STARS’ SALARIES.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3357, 9 December 1919, Page 7

OPERA STARS’ SALARIES.

WILL T‘-HEY RISE WITH COST ()E LIVING? (London Weekly Dispatch. ) ' 0 Opera impresnrios. must be feeling very uncomfortable at the spectacle of a world asking for higher wages. Supposing Ithe opera singer applies the same argument as the scene-shifter that salaries should be d-ouble pre-war ones on account of living now being twice as clear. It would mean that several of ‘the best-known artists‘ would refuse to open "their mouths for less than £IOOO a itime. _ Caruso has already put his price up, and it was not :1 very low one before the war. A few nrotnths ago he signed on at Copenhagen to appear at the Opera. House and on the concert stage for -la. limited number of performances at £2OOO :1 time. plus 10 per cent of the protfll'ts. Previously in 1912 he had touched £6OO a night in the "United States, and also did {L fourweeks’ concert tour of England in 1909 for £BOOO. In the s‘?anle year three per.

formances in “Cannon,” “Pagliacci” and. “La B'ohelne” at the Berlin Opera House brought him £SOO a time. His ']_)l"(,"x-'W{ll' avecragc fwais hbout £40,000 {L year, but if he manages 'ro acquire many contracts like his 1919 Danish one he will soon make this figure look .a mere piftance.

‘TETRAZZINPS £soo_ Tetrazzini is shortly to embark on 3. [our in this country. The terms of the contract have not been pubilshed, but i‘: inay be assumed she is not signing for love. Tel:ra:«:zini is by no means cheap. Oscar Hammerstein paid her £BOO every night she sang‘ at the Manhattan ‘Theatre, New York, in January, 1908, which made £BOOO for her forty perfo'rm\ances she .'received in South ‘American look small. In 1911 she signed contracts to sing at -the New York Metropolitan Opera House at ’.the highest salary said to have ever been paid to a woman sinvger. Supposing that Tetrazzini finds the cost of living twice as dear her notes will become very golden indeed. Destinnov-a, whom we have just heard, is another singer’ whose pre-war salary, if doubled, would make at: interesting figure. She was ‘booked to sing in New York in 1916, for 11 limited number of performances, and even then the price was £IO,OOO. In lthis case she lost the money because the Austrimi Government refilsed to ‘set her leave Boheznia. In i"le,e.ompal'a tively cheap days of ]9ll she Said to havelnamed £SOO as the smallest Sum for which she would siiigat the iNe\v York’ Metl'opo_lit-an. ’

Clmliapin, the great Russian, bass, took £4oo‘ a nigll’c. when he sang; at Drury Lane in 1914. He is now receiving £9OO a performnance, or rather more than £50,000 a. year, for singing lo Bolshcvik audiences in‘ Russia. As Albert Coates, the condum?or, -has r(.\mal'ked, “he can.‘ just about make ends meet’? on this sum, and probably he was not much worse off when he as getting £2 month in 1890 as an unknown. singer. A Bok»-hev.ik far‘runo is grlncmlly a gl'ozlt misfortune.

.MIE«'LBA’S SI¥LAL°RY'; - 3;[e}oa at Covent Garden in 1913 reeeived £SOO a performance, and booked a five monlths’ United States tour the same year for £40,000. She signed with Kubelik, ‘the '-.A'iolinist, for a joint tour of Camada, 100 concerts, for £loog.ooo—money guaranteed. It was estimated in 1913 that Melba had earned over £500,000 in opera and concert pla,tforms_ To this mus?t be added a sum Between £30,000 and £50,000 for ‘singing into gramophones.

But, even with all this trouble looming -ahead, impresarios must congratulate themeslves. on their good fortune when they remember ‘thaw Jean dc Resike is well embedded in retirement. Had he been in the full flush of his operatic triumphs today there. is no Saying what his post~w:n‘ salary would have been. He and his brother Edouard were s't.:3.te(l in 1900 to ha.ve made over a million sherling between Them by their voices. In 1902, when operatic salaries were still more or less within limits, the late Colonel“ Maplieson proposed to Jean de R-eske a tour of 40 performances ill -'the UlliT’~‘»d Sl.ate;,~ for £4o.‘ 000——i.e., £I,OOO a performance. All the sing‘er’s very considerable expenscs were to be paid in addition. The offer, however, was refused. The same thing happened when Heinrich Conreid, the then maimger of the New York Metropolitan Opera House, wanted him to hing for £450 anight. So opera directorates still have something to be thankful for, even if they do occasionally -sigh for -those fabulous days when Melba was singing four times a, week for £2O, and a eerhzin Tetrazzfni could be hizerl in Florence for £2O a inonth.