Elma B. Smith and Her New Company

              Figure

WALDEMAR VON GELTCH

Figure
RITA RICH
Figure
WILLIAM RUMMEL

FigureElma B. Smith and Her New Company

Sixth Season




A SLAYTON ATTRACTION






P
ROBABLY no entertainer who has ever come before the American public deserves stardom more than Elma B. Smith.  She is unquestionably the greatest imitator of children, birds and animals, now before the public.  Her imitations of birds, babes and children are a unique feature of her work and are the best of their kind on the platform.  Her imitations of children are so real and lifelike that they are the talk of the town for days after her departure.  We have a great many press criticisms of Miss Smith's work, but none seems to be able to describe her strongest point.  They all declare that she must be seen and heard to be thoroughly appreciated.  For the sixth consecutive season we present Elma B. Smith to the Lyceum platform, and have in her support the same excellent company that has toured with her the past season.  This company has traveled the United States from coast to coast, and has been pronounced the best popular concert company traveling.  The company consists of:  Rita Rich, giving folk songs of all nations in costume; Waldemar von Geltch, a young violinist of exceptional ability, and William Rummel, a brilliant young pianist, whom we have 
borrowed
 for a season from the faculty of one of the best piano schools in the country.





Press Comment



The Elma B. Smith Company gave an entertainment last night as part of the Y. M. C. A. course this winter.  The entertainment was most pleasing, and the large hall was packed with an appreciative audience.—


Baltimore (Md.) American.




Elma B. Smith, the child impersonator, gave a delightful entertainment at the opera house Saturday evening.  As an impersonator Miss Smith has few equals and the way she imitated the sounds of animals was wonderful.  She kept the audience in continuous laughter and applause.  If Miss Smith should visit this city again she would be sure of a large audience.—


Brookings (S. D.) Individual.




The usual large audience was drawn out Thursday evening when the Elma B. Smith Company gave an entertainment in the University Lecture Course.  The members of the company proved to be entertainers of the first class.  Miss Elma Smith proved herself one of the finest readers ever before a Wooster audience.  Miss Smith's imitations are simply wonderful, her monologue 
Roll Call at School
 being as clever a piece of work as one would wish to hear.—


Wooster (Ohio) Republican.



Miss Smith has never had a 
frost
 but is prepared for any sudden cold wave


SCOTCH


ENGLISH




F
OLK SONGS appeal to everybody.  They are the good old songs that we all can understand and appreciate—those who have not made a study of music, as well as those who have.  Miss Rich sings them as only an artist can.  She has a great fund of vivacity and good humor, and yet a vein of deep feeling runs through her nature, and a sympathy that brings her close to her audience.  She has made a thorough study of the songs of the people—the songs of love, war, peace, work, and play—the songs that touch the heart.  Those good old ballads of our forefathers which contain the character music of the different countries which they represent.  Miss Rich is gifted with a power of dialect, an animated face, delightful manner, and a sweet, clear soprano voice, which she uses with great good taste and judgment.  To hear and see her in her Folk Songs, which she costumes appropriately, will take the older people back to their youth, and give the younger people a glimpse of the true sentiment of by gone days.




The Irish and Scotch songs of Rita Rich in costume were pleasing and instructive, and a treat to lovers of music.  Miss Rich is a very fine impersonator as well as a noted vocalist.—


Gulfport (Miss.) Daily Tribune.




Rita Rich gave concert songs tonight, varying her program somewhat from the costume songs which are her specialty.  All of Miss Rich's work has been characterized by an earnestness of purpose, a sympathy with her audience and a power to move them to laughter or to tears.  She draws pictures with her songs, then gradually recedes, leaving the beautiful pictures still in the minds of her hearers.  Tonight, perhaps more than ever before, she exhibited the range of her tones, the sweetness and power and expressiveness of her voice, which is a dramatic soprano.—


New Orleans (La.) Daily Picayune.




Miss Elma B. Smith is well known to the patrons of entertainment courses, and her clever child impersonations last night made a decided hit with the house, and she had to yield to numerous encores.  Taken altogether, the entertainment last night was the best of its kind seen here this winter.—


Cedar Rapids (Ia.) Gazette.




There was a charming little lady who made one think she was much smaller, and who, when she depicted the wailing infant, carried one back to the long summer afternoons when he rocked the baby in its cradle for mother while the 
kids
 played ball in the street below, or organized a 
swimmin'
 expedition.—


Oskaloosa (Ia.) Times.




It required only a few touches for the audience to realize that some one quite removed from the ordinary violinist was performing.  The beautiful singing tones and the human qualities that are so seldom heard on the violin characterize his playing.  His performance of the immensely difficult Tschaikowsky Concerto was a technical revelation and a musical feat.—


Atlanta, Ga.




Waldemar von Geltch was the first soloistic attraction.  He chose the Bruch G Minor Concerto, which he played with much expression and ample technique and reaped prolonged applause.—


Richmond, Va.





The feature of the evening was the presence of Waldemar von Geltch, the violinist, who with a simplicity born of genius proved himself a true artist.  With confident and gentle touch, he approached the sympathetic chords of the human heart; then swept the emotions of his auditors and carried them at will from pathos to sublimity.—


Waukegan, Ill.



Rita Rich had fairly won the audience the night before by singing English Folk Songs, so many went again last night to hear her in the Irish and Indian songs, which as usual, she sang in costume.  Miss Rich's interpretation is unusually fine, and her words when singing can be clearly understood, a thing too often neglected in singing.—


Hattiesburg (Miss.) Daily Progress.




Rita Rich makes a hit.  She is a most charming and entertaining singer of marked ability and presents a fine repertoire of Child Songs, and Folk Songs of all nations.  The Folk Songs are rendered in costume and give excellent opportunity for studying the different characteristics of the English, Irish, Scotch, and Indians.  Her sweet and cultured soprano voice has called forth no end of praise.  She is a natural artist in the line of singing and impersonating.—


Keokuk (Ia.) Daily Gate City.




Miss Elma B. Smith and company completed the King course of entertainments last night.  This was Miss Smith's third appearance in Warren and the audience of 650 people proved her one of their favorites.  After the closing number, 
Roll Call at School,
 the audience simply refused to go, until she gave them another number, a tribute of merit rarely accorded a Lyceum artist.—


Warren, Pa.




The entertainment given last night at the First Methodist Church by Miss Elma B. Smith, reader, was fine, and heartily enjoyed by all.  Miss Smith is a whole show by herself.  Her presentation of 
Friday Afternoon at School
 was exceptionally good and kept the audience in a roar of laughter.—


Olean, N. Y.




Mr. von Geltch showed himself to be a master of the violin by his depth of feeling and splendid technique.  His rendering of the Paganini Concerto was especially brilliant.—


Milwaukee, Wis.




But the star attraction was Miss Smith.  From the bird notes in her first number, down to the finish, she led.  Her mimicry was nature itself.  Particularly in her 
Baby Cry
 did she score.  Several mothers present, who left their cradle charges in care of nurses, for a moment almost forgot their surroundings and a sort of 
hush-h-h-h-h
 went round nervously.  Miss Smith is a distinguished member of the 
Smith family,
 who will be welcomed again in Kane.—


Kane, Pa.




It is safe to say that very few in the large audience had ever heard a violinist to compare with Mr. Geltch.  Such marvelous and brilliant mastering of technical difficulties, such depth of temperament and musical soul, such exquisite, passionate sweetness of tone quality all reveal the master, and such is Mr. Geltch.—


Kankakee, Ill.



Management
Slayton Lyceum Bureau
Steinway Hall, Chicago


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MANZ ENGRAVING COMPANY THE HOLLISTER PRESS CHICAGO