Louise Homer: prima donna contralto of the Metropolitan Opera House, New York

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LOUISE HOMER
 Prima Donna Contralto of the Metropolitan Opera House, New York Concert Management: HENRY WOLFSOHN, New York




LOUISE HOMER



T
HERE is pleasure in recording the artistic accomplishments and brilliant career of Mme. LOUISE HOMER, leading prima donna contralto of the Metropolitan Opera House, New York.  Gifted with great charm of personality and magnetic powers of no small degree, lovely of presence, the possessor of a voice such as there are no two in the whole world, one feels when she steps upon the stage that a rare artistic performance may be expected.  Mme. Homer's successes have been achieved in the greatest contralto roles in the operatic repertoire, such as 
Amneris
 (Aïda), 
Laura
 (La Gioconda), 
Azucena
 (Il Trovatore), 
Otrud
 (Lohengrin), 
Brangaene
 (Tristan und Isolde), 
Erda
 (Siegfried), 
Fricka
 (Walküre), 
Samson and Delilah,
 and others.




Mme. Homer was born in Pittsburg, Pa., her father, William Trimble Beatty, being pastor and founder of the Shady Side Presbyterian Church, and founder of the Western Pennsylvania College for Women.  Mme. Homer began the development of her exceptional voice in Philadelphia and later studied in Boston, where she married Mr. Sidney Homer, known far and wide as a song composer.  Shortly after her marriage Mme. Homer decided to continue her studies in Europe, and after two years in Paris she made a debut before one of the most select and notable audiences of musicians and critics of France, achieving a most emphatic success, so much so that she was engaged for the following season for Covent Garden, London, where she made her debut as 
Amneris
 in May, 1899.  While engaged there she sang for Queen Alexandra (then Princess of Wales) at Buckingham Palace, and was invited by the late Queen Victoria to sing at the first State Concert in Buckingham Palace.  In September of the same year Mme. Homer was called to the Royal Opera 
de la Monnaie
 of Brussels, where she remained eight months, singing one hundred performances during this period, returning to Covent Garden, London, in the spring of the same season.  The result of her triumphs in London was her engagement for the Metropolitan Opera House, New York, where she has had the rare distinction of singing seven successive seasons, firmly establishing herself in the hearts of the music-loving people of the metropolis, and where she has just been re-engaged for two more seasons.






A FEW SHORT PRESS EXCERPTS



GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG AT THE METROPOLITAN Mme. Nordica as Brünnhilde and Mme. Homer as Waltraute make a Captivating Pair of Soloists




The 
Ring
 is ended.  In the concluding performance of 
Gotterdammerung
 last night the triumphs of the performance were carried by two American singers, Mme. Nordica, the noblest of Brunnhildes, and Mme. Homer, the newest of Waltrautes.




But for the efforts of Mme. Homer the beautiful music of Waltraute would have been cut, strange as the assertion may sound at a day when Wagnerian traditions are supposedly so firmly set.  Never has Mme. Homer sung so well, with such phrasing, feeling and intelligence.





HER FULL BEAUTY REVEALED



Not until she came before the curtain with the other artists at the close of the act, and in the strong light, was her beauty in the Waltraute costume of blue, silver, and white fully revealed.—


New York Journal.




The part of Waltraute was sung most beautifully and impressively by Mme. Homer, who seems to add an inch to her artistic stature from month to month.—


New York Evening Post.




Mme. Homer as Waltraute appeared to marked advantage.  Her voice in the great narrative of the declining Walhalla was hauntingly rich and beautiful.—


New York Globe.





LOHENGRIN



An excellent impersonation was that of Mme. Homer, whose work both as singer and actress has been most remarkable.  There was not only more sustained beauty in her voice than of yore, but she acted the part more realistically, suggesting the true character of that fiend concerning whom Wagner said:  
Ortrud is a woman who does not know love.  This expresses everything, even the most terrible.  Her sphere is politics.  A political man is detestable, but a political woman is an atrocity.  Such an atrocity I had to portray.
  It is too bad that so estimable a lady as Mme. Homer should have to devote so much of her time to portraying witches and political women, but an opera singer cannot be finical.—


New York Evening Post.




Mme. Homer sang with superb purity and volume of tone, and the great scene of the Invocation in Act II marked one of this American contralto's best public performances.—


New York Mail and Express.




Mme. Louise Homer divided the honors with Mme. Sembrich.  The quality of Mme. Homer's voice which won her such marked applause on Thursday evening became more apparent in her work as Ortrud.  This rich, vibrant texture that is noticeable throughout Mme. Homer's great range has a fascination for the ear, a sort of haunting power.  When Ortrud pleaded, the round voice had a caressing note.  When she hated, the tones broadened with a fearful encompassing reach.  When she exalted, the notes rang like jubilant bells.

The duet with Frederick of Telramund held the audience spellbound.  This scene was followed by that in which the scheming Ortrud works her will with regard to the trusting Elsa.  Still following comes the scene in which Ortrud seeks to poison the nobles against Lohengrin.  It is a magnificent climax when she succeeds in making Elsa doubt her lover, even while his arms are about her.  It cannot be told how Mme. Homer accomplishes such a climax.  Voice built on gesture and gesture on voice, the structure growing ever until the audience, able to resist no longer, burst into applause ere the scene could draw to a close.—


Toronto Daily Star.





SIEGFRIED



Mme. Homer made 
Erda
 majestically vocal.—


New York Evening Sun.





TRISTAN UND ISOLDE



Louise Homer sang and acted the part of Brangaene with beautiful results.  Her tones pealed forth with wonderful mellowness and penetrating sweetness.  Particularly beautiful was Brangaene's warning call in the second act, which for once was sung true to the pitch and gave the impression of distance, so essential in bringing that incomparable page in Wagner's score to full effect.  But it was not through her vocal art alone that the admirable contralto delighted; her impersonation revealed many little details of act and gesture, which showed a thorough and sympathetic study of the role.—


New York Press.





LA GIOCONDA



There were five minutes of emotional singing on Monday night.  They came in the trio of the last act of 
La Gioconda.
  Mmes. Nordica and Homer and M. Caruso have never sung this passage so beautifully before.  It was thrilling; and many people who had started to leave the house, for it was growing late, tarried under its spell.  To what did it owe its peculiar beauty?  To exquisite vocal tone, intelligently applied by three artists who felt the dramatic meaning of the situation and the expressive force of the music.  No amount of dramatic insight, no power of temperament, no exercise of energy could have led these three artists to such a beautiful achievement if they had not wisely used the natural beauty of their voices.—


New York Sun.





AÏDA



Hardly less impressive was Louise Homer, who, as Amneris, also made her first appearance this season in 
Aida.
  She looked beautiful, sang ravishingly and acted with understanding and spirit.—


New York Press.




Mme. Homer's Amneris was a commanding and forceful characterization of one o, Verdi's best dramatic figures.  She sang with breadth and with obvious and gratifying ease.  There was a hint of reserve power in all that she did, except in certain slightly over-accentuated poses in the last act, when she listened with anguish to the walling-up of the traitor Rhadames.  This scene was one of the opera's climaxes, however, and the contralto received unstinted applause and several recalls.—
New York Mail and Express.



VERDI'S GREAT 
AÏDA
 Superbly Sung at the Academy Last Night The Audience Thrilled

TRIUMPH OF MME. GADSKI AND MME. HOMER



Verdi's greatest opera, 
Aida,
 was superbly sung last night at the Academy, by Mme. Gadski, Mme. Homer, Alvarez, Scotti, and Journet.

It must be said that Mme. Homer has reached the highest, and raised the standard still higher.  She has evidently given the role unusual study, and every phase is brought out with unmistakable brilliancy and effectiveness.  Mme. Homer's Amneris is an instance of vocal splendor, combined with marked intelligence in the interpretation of the character, rarely seen on the operatic stage, and establishes a standard that will be difficult to surpass.—

Philadelphia Item.




DAMNATION OF FAUST



Mme. Homer achieved a veritable triumph.  Both in the dramatic and the lyric passages she was nearly ideal.  Her beautiful quality of voice was a constant source of pleasure.  The 
King of Thule
 ballad had just the folksong simplicity Berlioz demanded.  In the exquisite romance after the betrayal in Part IV, 
My Heart With Grief is Heavy,
 her commanding musicianship was most impressive.  Division of measure was a convenience, not an accent for subdividing the phrase; syncopation became a natural expression for breathless, agitated emotion.  She sang throughout with insight, warmth, tenderness and artistic judgment.  In no previous work here has she sung with greater breadth of style or greater brilliancy than in 
The Damnation of Faust.
—


The Boston Journal.





IL TROVATORE



The Azucena of Mme. Homer was a surprise, a delight and a triumph.  An overworked and almost worn out word is 
intense,
 and yet there is none other that can convey the concentrated, wild, fiery, passionate, ungovernable nature of the old gypsy woman as she bore it in upon her audience.

In the sense that it conveyed thrillingly and commandingly the horror, the woe and the despair of the past, the affection and devotion of the present, and the hunger for vengeance and retribution in the future, it was a grand dramatic achievement for voice, facial illumination and action indicative of indomitable revolt and defiance.  If Mme. Homer can maintain this impersonation on its present plane and perfect it in some minor particulars it should be ranked among the greatest Azucenas of the world.—

Boston Herald.



Verdi's tuneful opera, sung by such popular favorites as Mmes. Nordica and Homer, MM. de Marchi, Campanari, and Journet, succeeded last night in drawing one of the largest audiences of the season.  Mme. Homer sang the part of Azucena with the plentitude of rich vocal effects that Mme. Schumann-Heink, whose successor she seems destined to be, alone could rival.  The two Americans, Mmes. Homer and Nordica, indeed, carried off the honors of the whole evening.—


New York Evening Post.





WORCESTER FESTIVAL Madame Homer's Magnificent Singing in 
The Prophet
 was the Feature of the Program Given Last Night



From the former, ignoring the outworn air 
Mon Fils,
 Mme. Homer took the unfamiliar but intensely dramatic scene, 
O Pretres de Baal,
 which she delivered magnificently, filling it with emotion and illuminating it with all the brilliancy that Meyerbeer has indicated.





HOMER SCENE EFFECTIVE



It should be noted that Mme. Homer's scene was very effective and drew an encore call, which she answered with 
Che Faro,
 also fervently and broadly given.—


Boston Journal.




Mrs. Homer sang the aria 
O Priests of Baal,
 from 
The Prophet,
 with true dramatic force.  She managed skillfully her thrilling voice, and she achieved the feat of being dramatic, even in bravura.  The long and hearty applause was richly deserved.  Mrs. Homer sang the familiar aria from Gluck's 
Orpheus
 as an encore.—


Boston Herald.




THE GREATEST AMOUNT OF INTEREST during the evening centered in the appearance of Mme. Louise Homer.  She achieved such a success on her former appearances this week that all those who had previously listened to her beautiful voice were determined to avail themselves of the pleasure once more.  She appeared on the platform gowned in black and white.  Mme. Homer has a very pleasing personality and in responding several times to the enthusiastic demand for more she beamed her sweetest smiles on the audience, and had a special package for the musical people and newspaper women who sat on the front benches near the entrance to the reception room.  Some of them were ready to sing

WILL YE NO' COME BACK AGAIN?

but they gave expression to that wish in a hearty handclap.—
Worcester Telegram.



SYMPHONY CONCERT CROWDS LAFAYETTE Madame Homer a Sensation



The second concert of the Washington Symphony Orchestra, given yesterday afternoon at the Lafayette Square Opera House, was noteworthy for many things—for a fine performance of three splendid compositions; for the presence of an audience which filled every section of the theatre and applauded with much discrimination; and for the unqualified pleasure given
 by the singing of Mme. Louise Homer, the soloist of the afternoon.  From every point of view the concert was a pronounced success.  But it will be chiefly remembered for the admirable singing of the soloist.


MME. HOMER'S TRIUMPH



Mme. Homer proved a vocal sensation in a season which has included Mme. Melba, Mme. Sembrich, Signor Campanari, M. Journet, and which promises Mme. Schumann-Heink and Mr. Bispham.  Such singing as hers—simple, pure, unclouded by tawdry ornamentation—reflects the highest possible use of the human voice.  A thousand lesser lights can trill and warble.  Only a voice and a temperament like Mme. Homer's can produce such beautiful simplicity as her singing of yesterday afternoon.—


Washington Times.




The soloist yesterday was Mrs. Louise Homer, mezzo-soprano of the Metropolitan Opera House company of New York, and her work created positive enthusiasm.  She has a voice of great sweetness and power, clear and true in the upper register, full and rich in its lower tones, and she sings with perfect ease and freedom.  Her first number was the comparatively familiar aria from Verdi's 
Don Carlos,
 
O don Fatale,
 which was sung with such dramatic effect that an encore was demanded, and Mrs. Homer gave 
Nobil Signor,
 from the opera of 
The Huguenots,
 displaying the splendid control she has over her voice and its great flexibility.  For her second number she sang Listz's 
Die Lorelei
 and the aria 
Mon Coeur S'ouvre a ta voix,
 from Saint-Saens' 
Samson and Delilah,
 both of which were charmingly given, the latter showing great breadth of tone and splendid phrasing.  For her encore she repeated the aria fully as effectively as she first sang it.—


Washington Evening Star.




Mme. Homer covered herself with glory in Fides' great aria from the prison scene in 
Le Prophete.
  Her noble, splendidly trained voice was heard to the greatest advantage, and she sang in the real grand style, making the mad burst of coloratura at the end mean something.  Her phrasing, her legato, and her use of the mezza voce were all very beautiful indeed.  For an encore, which was insisted upon, Mme. Homer sang 
Che Faro,
 from 
Orfeo.
—


Boston Transcript.





ELGAR'S 
DREAM OF GERONTIUS



Mme. Homer's first solo was not exceeded in beauty by any succeeding number.  Her voice was powerful, with no loss of mellowness; it is liquid as a bird's note, yet able to lead the chorus of Angels of which the soul cries:

The sound is like the rushing of the wind—The summer wind, among the lofty pines.—


New York Evening Sun.