Season 1910-1911
The twenty-sixth season at the Metropolitan began on November 14th, and ended on April 15th, thus embracing twenty-two weeks. When the public was invited to subscribe for the season in the summer, performances were promised in French, Italian, German, and English. In the preceding two years there had been talk of producing Goldmark’s “Heimchen am Heerd” (“The Cricket on the Hearth”) and Humperdinck’s “Königskinder” in English, and so there was again this; but on his return from Europe in the fall Signor Gatti put a quietus on it immediately by proclaiming that the project was impracticable. Nevertheless, in midseason he announced an opera in English by an American composer (Arthur Nevin’s “Twilight”), and withdrew it, although the public had been told to expect it. Meanwhile a somewhat singular combination of circumstances led to a partial fulfilment of the promise in the prospectus. Mr. Dippel, who had undertaken the management of the Chicago Opera Company (renamed the Philadelphia-Chicago Company after the Chicago season was over and that in Philadelphia begun), had carried with him from New York the purpose to give opera in the vernacular. He was encouraged in this by Mr. Clarence Mackay and Mr. Otto Kahn, the chief backers of the Chicago institution, but the Chicago season was not long enough to enable him to bring it to fruition. For his second season at the Manhattan Opera House, Mr. Hammerstein had promised to produce an English opera “by our American composer, Victor Herbert” (see p. 372). This opera, entitled “Natoma,” had been offered to Signor Gatti-Casazza, and an act of it tried with orchestra on the stage of the Metropolitan; but the director did not care to produce it. It was then offered to Mr. Dippel, who accepted it, and produced it first in Philadelphia and then at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York, where the Philadelphia-Chicago company gave a subscription series of French operas on Tuesdays from January to April. To this incident there is a pendant of more serious purport. The Directors of the Metropolitan Opera Company had met what seemed to them a challenge on the part of Mr. Hammerstein by offering a prize of $10,000 for the best opera in English by a native-born American composer. The time allowed for the competition was two years and the last day for the reception of scores September 15th, 1910. On May 2nd the jury of award, composed of Alfred Hertz, Walter Damrosch, George W. Chadwick, and Charles Martin Loeffler, announced that the successful opera was a three-act musical tragedy entitled “Mona,” of which the words were written by Brian Hooker, the music by Professor Horatio Parker of Yale University.
The change of plan occasioned by the abandonment of the representations at the New Theater and in Baltimore, the latter city being left to the ministrations of Mr. Dippel’s organization, brought with it a large reduction of the Metropolitan forces, but the smaller company nevertheless gave eight performances in Philadelphia and fourteen in Brooklyn besides those called for by the subscription and special representations in New York. Support on occasions had been promised by the affiliated companies in Chicago and Boston, but the little that was offered was not very graciously received by the New York public. Mme. Melba sang once in “Rigoletto,” and once again in “Traviata,” one of the two performances being in the regular subscription list. Then she was announced as ill, and departed for England. Mlle. Lipowska sang a few times, as also did Signor Constantino (who had been a member of Mr. Hammerstein’s company and was now the principal tenor in Boston), but the public was indifferent to these performances of the old Verdi operas.
Interesting incidents were the visits of Signor Puccini and Herr Humperdinck to superintend the rehearsals and witness the first performances on any stage of their operas, “La Fanciulla del West” and “Königskinder,” the latter of which was sung in the original German instead of the promised English. For the Italian opera the management had arranged two special performances at double prices; these were popular failures in spite of the interest excited by Mr. David Belasco’s play “The Girl of the Golden West,” on which the opera was based. The presence of the Russian dancers, who had won much favor in the preceding season, was particularly fortunate in the closing weeks of the season, when another failure of Signor Caruso’s voice threatened disaster. Mme. Pavlowa and her companion, M. Mordkin, supported by a very mediocre troupe of dancers, had discovered themselves to their admirers before the opera season opened. They then took part in the Metropolitan entertainments until the end of the first week of January. Thereupon they departed, but came back very opportunely for the second fortnight of March.
The rest of the story may be read out of the following table and remarks. There were twenty-two weeks of opera with subscription performances on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday evenings, and Saturday afternoons. At these performances operas were given as follows: