THREE GIRLS AND A MAN

New Zealand Listener, Volume 2, Issue 28, 5 January 1940, Page 15

THREE GIRLS AND A MAN

| Singing Songs For The NBS _ | ~-he

VERYBODY knows Hollywood’s liking for names like " Hundred Men and a Girl,’ "Four Daughters," "Three Sons," etc. So we head this "Three Girls and a Man." The cast? Julie Werry, Cecily Audibert, Vera Martin, and Thomas E. West, in the roles of soprano, soprano, contralto and tenor. They have been heard over the air from 2YA during the past week or two, presenting all kinds of things from classical songs to the latest hits. They are also appearing in "Look and Listen,’ the popular revue produced by the National Broadcasting Service. They have come to Wellington in connection with the plan of the NBS to gather together artists from different parts of the Dominion to perform at the Exhibition Studio. As you've already made their acquaintance over the air, we thought you'd like to meet them; so we interviewed them in the 2YA studios the other day. " A Real Trouper " Miss Audibert was sitting at the piano. We asked where she came from and she said, " Christchurch . . . Oh, I came from England originally but have lived in Christchurch for some years." She received her training in Australia -‘but I did not go to the Conservatoire,’ she hastened to point out with a laugh. What else? Oh, she liked animals. She has a wire-haired terrier called Alec. Music runs in her veins. Her mother was a singer and her grandfather, who originally came from France, was wellknown in London in his day as a composer and conductor. Miss Audibert is a real trouper; she has done stage work besides radio, and was with the Humphtrey Bishop company in Australia for two and a-half years. Lately, she confided, she has been doing mostly classical and lieder singing, and the presentations over 2YA are the first light work she has done for some time. Whatever she sings over the radio is bound to be well-received, however. When Peter Dawson was out here last, he heard her ‘sing and told her she had a perfect broadcasting voice. Just Back From America Next we had a chat with Julie Werry. She has only just returned from the United States, and has many interesting recollections to give of her trip. On the way to Canada, where she went first, she spent one: evening in Honolulu which she says will be hard to forget for sheer loveliness. In the States and in Canada Miss — Werry gave stage and radio performances. Most she enjoyed singing at Stanford University in Palo Alto, where there is a fine concert hall. She heard among other people that idol of the States, John Charles Thomas, who is by far the most popular artist appearing there now, she thinks. She heard Lily Pons, too, and one magnificent per- — formance of Wagner's "Tristan and

no Isolde" with Alexander Kipnis, Melchior and Kirsten Flagstad. That was at the San Francisco opera house. She found the people there far more concertminded than here. And one point which our Air Force may take note of: Maori music seems to be very popular in Canada. Started Early Miss Martin hails from Nelson, but has lived in Christchurch for some time, She started her singing early, for on her eighteenth birthday she sang in a performance of "The Messiah" in Nelson, Nine or ten years ago she made her first broadcast, and since then has been heard regularly from New Zealand Stations. She has broadcast in Sydney, too, during a holiday spent there a year or two ago. Mostly she sings lieder, and likes Brahms and Schumann _ compositions especially; but she is also fond of Elgar, She likes singing from the Exhibition studio; she said it’s the easiest place she has found yet to sing in, and the sensation of having an audience is good too. She was "surprised and delighted " that eager faces pressed against the studio window did not make her at all nervous. She likes animals — especially dogs; and then sport. Golf and bathing. " Sunbathing" she adds as a qualification. Also gardening. Her own smilingly-given self-critic~ ism: "I’m just an ordinary sort of person." Australian Experience And now we come to the man, Thomas E. West is what-one usually calls a "likeable sort of chap." Which! means to say that he usually has a. friendly grin on his tanned face and a merry twinkle in his eyes. Modestly he says he has sung with many choral societies here and in Australia, has been broadcasting since 1933, and has appeared at many concerts. Last year in Australia he worked for the ABC. He’s a versatile man; in Sydney the friends he stayed with were bookmakers, so he took a job for several weeks as change clerk. (It’s all right-it’s legal over there!) He is outspoken and frank when he has a real opinion to give. For example: He thought the musical standard at the conservatoire concerts he attended in Australia is lower than that of student work being done here. Artists in Australia are boosted more than they are here. He himself sings mostly ballads of alight type because, he candidly says, people like them. He likes his own country. " Before I went away," he says, "I always wanted to leave New Zealand. But the trip to Australia showed me how much better it is to live here." And when he says that he means it! His hobby? It happens to be motor cars, so when we asked what his pet aversion was, it turned out to be traffic officers. But he doesn’t really have any pet aversions, because he’s not that sort of man,