Press Clippings for the week ending
Saturday, 25 May 2002
A random selection of cuttings
from newspapers and magazines
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Jackson Haines, ice skater, in 1865
‘Royal Alhambra… Jackson Haines, the incarnation of gracefulness upon skates, has at the Alhambra a much better chance of exhibiting his remarkable dexterity than at the Halls in which he has previously appeared. The extensive area of the stage enables him to go through his evolutions with far greater effect. An appropriate scene is set, and Mr. Haines concludes his entertainment with the amusing representation of a "Dundreary" swell upon the ice for the first time. He takes some tremendous back falls, but avoids concussion of the brain, as Lord Dundreary never could, supposing he had any brains.’ * * * * * * * * A blast at the rising popularity of music hall comic singers, London, 1867
‘LOW ART IN HIGH PLACES. Mr. [Frederick] Gye [manager of the Opera House, Covent Garden, adjacent to the fruit and flower market] is to be sent to Coventry, the market for Song in the Haymarket may literally be said to be in the market, and to be had for a song. [Giovanni] Mario [the tenor (formerly known as Giovanni Matteo de Candia)] may turn his fine organ in Paris (if the Parisians will only hear him), and [the soprano, Giulia] Grisi may go to Madrid (if she has the courage). There is every chance of there being no [Pauline] Lucca [the soprano] about either Opera House. Comic vocalism is all the rage. Music à la Lloyd is to supersede music unalloyed by buffoonery. High Art is to be knocked off her pedestal, and Low Art is grinningly to assume her place, and cry, "Here we are." Royalty [ie. Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, at a private party given by the Earl of Carrington] patronizes the Comic Muse, and the world consequently apes royalty. Whitehall affords a shelter to the Jolly [John] Nash, and forthwith St. George’s Hall gives a home to Arthur Lloyd. We take our wives to hear "Tootle-tootle-tootle" on the cornet, and our daughters are lost in admiration at [Lloyd singing] "Pollee-woollee-hama, [The Jolly Japanese]." Or course they laugh immoderately because they have heard somewhere or other in fashionable circles that Royalty one night laid aside its dignity and laughed loud and long at the melancholy exhibition. We owe royalty a deep debt of gratitude for directing public taste into so new and healthy and refined and elevated a channel. Arthur Lloyd, we greet you; the Jolly Nash here’s our hand. Covent Garden [Opera House] a long adieu: Her Majesty’s [Theatre, Haymarket] a last farewell. Our stall is vacant: the Lobby knows us not. The harmonies of Verdi and Donizetti and Gounod are no longer the thing.’ * * * * * * * * A bouquet shunned, London, 1878
‘The efforts of a young actress are too frequently marred by the injudicious compliments of foolish admirers. We had an instance of this on Thursday at the Queen’s [Theatre, Long Acre, London], when Miss Maud Milton, in Fatherland, immediately on making her appearance, had thrown to her a handsome bouquet. Very wisely she treated it with indifference; and the impulsive youth who had wasted his money on it had the mortification of seeing it picked up, at the termination of the act, by one of the stage attendants. He will do well to shun bouquets for the rest of his life.’ * * * * * * * * Postcards are passé, London, 1911
‘… Post-Cards of actresses are quite things of the past. They have little or no selling value now.’ * * * * * * * * Gounod’s Charleston, London, 1926
‘King Jazz has overcome all opposition, and now reigns without a rival in all the dancings, even to the bars of the East End. Like a certain Alexander, however, he dreams of fresh worlds to conquer, and the jazz bands are poking their noses into spheres in which they have no business. In many pieces they play one can recognise popular operatic airs, though much mangled, being played in a different tempo. The other day one of the foremost jazz orchestras played the trio from Gounod’s Faust as a Charleston if you please! It must sound shocking to old-fashioned people to hear this sentimental air played in a jumpy fashion with saxophones, trombones, horns and other noisy instruments.’ |
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© John Culme, 2002