Madame Ada Crossley

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVII, Issue 4372, 11 February 1909, Page 3

Madame Ada Crossley

AN IMPKEBSION

We were horribly late having hurried into Paeroa at the tail of an interminable string of coal trucks, for which we had waited at Te Aroha more than threequart- rs of an hour. We stepped up the sawdusted floor of the Criterion Theatre as softly as we knew how, intercepting for the moment the great singer, who stood smilingly confronting an audience which began to vent its eagerness ere we thankfully crushed into a seat and subsided.

Then there fell the grand strains of Handel’s Lirgo, that traucendent music to which one never seems to hear word which are adequate, it was over too soon, and the audience, responding as ohe, to the voice for which they had waited so thirstily applauded and applauded and would not rest until the pathetic “ On the Banks of Allen Water.’-’ took the ear with its pathos. Even then they were not satisfied and the great singer came forward in response to a second recall with a very dainty rendering of “ Orphan Annie’s come to stay,” which she sang with the archest air possible, to the entire delight of her listeners. Mr Leon Sametini followed with : —(a) Nocturne, (b) Minuet, Chopin-Sarasate, and Mozart, His execution was very fine, the harmonics in the former piece being exquisitely treated. Mr John Harrison’s “ O Vision Entrancing,” was very fine, aud his “I’ve searched the thorny Copse for you,” with the exquisitely delicate refrain :

“ I set such store by you I felt so sure of you, But I’ll no more of you, And so farewell,” was a thing never to be forgotten. Mr Percy Grainger’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 12 Lizt was magnificent, and inevitably led to a recall. Mr Jay Ryan’s “ The Colleen Bawn ” was very warmly received, his pleasing presence adding a charm of its own to his singing. Madame Crossley’s “ Through Love to Light ” was rapturously applauded, and when as one cf the encores which her audience demanded afterwards she rendered

“ Oh ! that we two were tuaying ” her wonderful voice, utttering itself in language touched by the sheer simplicity of genius, went straight to the heart, Her audieuce lost control of itself,, applauding and applauding, and when someone from among the gods and goddesses gave her the Australian “ cooee,” one felt the tears spring to ones eyes, and wondered at- the coincidence which befell as she ended her night’s performance with ‘ ‘ Home sweet home.

We streamed out into the dim street, aud so home across the miles of moonlit fen, with the vision of that gracious lady with the wonderful voice fixed in our memories forever.