The Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company

              The Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company

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PHOTOS BY GIBSON, SYKES & FOWLER, MCVICKER'S THEATER BUILDING, CHICAGO


Evenings with Famous Authors and Composers


CLARE VAUGHAN WALES,
Reader


GRACE LA VERGNE MILLER,
Contralto


ESTELLA MERICA,
Violinist


HAROLD E. HUNIE,
Baritone



Direction Central Lyceum Bureau, Fred Pelham, Mgr., 415–420 Orchestra Bldg., Chicago





ESTELLA MERICA



Frostburg (Md.) Herald
— The large and appreciative audience which braved the inclement weather last Monday night and attended the recital, one of a series of entertainments being presented by the Y. M. C. A., at the opera house, enjoyed a rare treat.  The program consisted of readings and music by Clare Vaughan Wales and her company.  Mrs. Wales is a reader of unusual ability, and makes a special feature of short stories.  Her charming personality, her cultivated, beautiful voice, together with the perfect rendition of her selections and faultless portrayal of human nature, which is indeed true to life, command the rapt attention and sympathy of her audience from the start, moving them to laughter or tears by her powerful magnetism and winsome charm.  Mrs. Wales has considerable dramatic ability, and her appearance will always give genuine pleasure.


The Gallowegian (Galloway College) Searcy, Neb.
— The Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company, the first number on our lecture course, was a rare musical treat, long to be remembered by the Galloway girls.  The reader, Mrs. Wales, was charming in both tragedy and dialect, and from the beginning she held her hearers spellbound by her matchless art.



The Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company
For Clare Vaughan Wales and her excellent company the season just ended has been one gigantic success.  This company enjoys the distinction of being one of the very few of whom not one adverse criticism has been offered this season, so far as the management has been able to discover.  Mrs. Wales has proven herself more than ever able to lead this aggregation of superior artists, having more than sustained the difficult standard set for her.  ¶ In addition to the high-class program of readings and music, Mrs. Wales has produced, as a closing number, a one-act comedy, with most flattering success.  These comedies will form a strong feature of a delightful program the coming season, and will furnish just that element of something new so much desired by committees, and not to be furnished by any other company of its kind.  The personnel of the company remains the same as last season, with one exception, and committees may be assured of perfect satisfaction in all programs, whether with or without the comedy.—THE MANAGEMENT.


The Critic, in The Lyceumite, March 15, 1906
— The program of this company glides easily, gracefully and entertainingly to a climax.  In other words, the nearer the program approaches its end the better it is.  The audience recognized this, for at first there was fair applause, then one encore, then two encores, then three encores, and then — well, had the hour not grown late I dare say the recalls would have reached huge numerical proportions.  And be it known the audience was one of the largest and most cultured I have seen this busy season.  The program is well arranged, and is balanced in a way not to appear too heavy nor too light.  The principal numbers represent the best authors and composers; the encores are light, clever and catchy.  * * * And this brings me to the end of a delightful program — a sketch — A Pair of Lunatics.  I have not seen all the sketches presented on the platform, but A Pair of Lunatics is the best acted one I have seen up to now.  Mrs. Wales and Mr. Hunie never once gave me the horrors of amateurishness.  A Pair of Lunatics is not new, but it has been changed until it seems so.  Mrs. Wales and Mr. Hunie can afford to feel proud of their work — no straining for effects, no clowning, no exaggeration.  They play with a quiet reserve, and Mr. Hunie, knowing nothing of elocutionary rules, does not try to act, and therefore acts with a spontaneity that is infectious and a naturalness that is art.


Peoria (Ill.) Herald Transcript
— The appearance of the Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company at the Y. M. C. A. auditorium last evening marked one of the most successful star course concerts of the present season.  Although Mrs. Wales is supported by an excellent company, the chief interest in the program last evening centered in her recitations.  Mrs. Wales has a fine voice, a splendid stage presence and dramatic ability.


Rockford (Ill.) Morning Star
— Much was expected of last evening's attraction in the Y. M. C. A. course, and that Clare Vaughan Wales and her excellent company fulfilled the expectations of the large and representative audience was evident from the spontaneity of applause accorded the artists.  Mrs. Wales was well supported, although the interest naturally centered in the reader herself, who has achieved so enviable a place in the realm of dramatic art and humorous impersonation.  Nature has been generous in endowing Mrs. Wales with a personality both magnetic and winsome, and has given her a voice which culture has well fitted for her chosen work.


Cumberland (Md.) Daily News
— The Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company's appearance last night at the Y. M. C. A. auditorium resulted in one of the best entertainments of its kind ever heard in the city and was thoroughly enjoyed by the large audience.  Mrs. Wales is a reader for whom there is a great future.  She interpreted several characters and the audience only reluctantly allowed her to leave the stage after she had responded to several encores.


Columbia (Pa.) News
— The Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company played to a greatly pleased audience and they will find a hearty welcome should they ever return to Columbia.  This is especially true of Mrs. Wales, the reader and impersonator.


Barberton (O.) Leader
— It was indeed one of the best entertainments of its kind ever heard in the city.


Leetonia (O.) Reporter
— This company has proven itself to be the equal, if not the superior, of the best we have ever had during the nine years of lecture courses in the city.  We hope that more such talent may be brought to Leetonia.


Athens (Pa.) Evening News
— The entertainment by the Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company was pronounced one of the best of the season.  The wise selection of this high-class company is a credit to the management of the course.


New York Tribune
— One of the prominent readers during the recent convention of elocutionists was Clare Vaughan Wales of Chicago.  She gave a reading, Silence, by Mary A. Wilkins, and those who were so fortunate as to hear her enjoyed her interpretation of this dramatic story.  Mrs. Wales has a fine stage presence, a good voice and discerning insight for character delineation.  The simplicity and sympathy that appear in her work are decidedly pleasing.


Chicago Evening Post
— Mrs. Wales showed remarkable elocutionary powers.  Her intonation was exceptionally good and she kept her audience convulsed with laughter or moved to tears at will.


Chicago Tribune
— The audience was large, cultured and critical, but not cold, as the frequent and long continued applause abundantly showed.  Mrs. Wales, always magnetic and charming, fairly outdid herself on this occasion, showing higher gifts of insight, finer dramatic power and greater versatility than formerly disclosed.


Mt. Vernon (O.) Banner
— The entertainment given by The Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company Tuesday evening was very fine and greatly pleasing to the large audience present.


Lock Haven (Pa.) Express
— The Clare Vaughan Wales Concert and Comedy Company drew a large andience and everybody was delighted.



Miss Estella Merica who enters upon her third season with this company, has proven herself a most delightful and capable artist.  To her is due a large share of the company's success.  Miss Merica is of Spanish extraction and comes from a long line of music lovers, her grandfather having been a violinist of no mediocre ability.  She has won her high place before a critical public by conscientious work, and to committees who know the company, the announcement of her re-engagement will bring genuine satisfaction.


Marinette Argus
— Miss Estella Merica, violinist, pleased the audience by her charming manner before she began playing, but was then a revelation to them.  She produced an exquisite tone and played with expression, giving several very difficult selections with remarkable effect.  For her initial number she played Fantaisie Militaire, by Leonard, which allowed full scope for her unusual powers, in which she showed herself a really great artist.


Chicago Record-Herald
— The list of successful players is a long one, and from it we choose the young ladies who have carried Chicago's fame to distant shores: Miss Leonora Jackson, pupil of Mr. Jacobsohn, now well known on both sides of the ocean, Miss Currie Duke, Estella Merica and Flora Drescher.


The Chicago Presto
— Miss Estella Merica also scored a triumph for Mr. Jacobsohn as well as herself by her exquisite interpretation of the Vieuxtemps Fantaisie Caprice.  She is a violinist of rare talent and ability.


Milwaukee (Wis.) Journal
— But it was in the Vieuxtemps Fantasia Appassionata that the young artist showed her true power.  Never did violin reveal more sympathy, or speak in tenderer voice than at this New Year's concert.  Miss Merica's execution on this sweetest of instruments was at once brilliant, sympathetic and thorough.



Mr. Hunie The engagement of Mr. Harold E. Hunie for Mrs. Wales' company last season proved him to be a strong acquisition, and it is with genuine satisfaction to the management that he has been persuaded to continue for another season.  Mr. Hunie possesses a baritone voice of great richness and power and musical temperament to a large degree.  In addition to this, he is seen at his best in his delightful comedy work with Mrs. Wales.


Chicago Daily Journal
— Another man's voice which deserves special mention is that of Mr. Harold E Hunie, who has a fine dramatic baritone, which he uses to good advantage.


New York Musical Courier
— Harold E. Hunie, a baritone of great promise, took the part of Count Arnheim.  His voice has a peculiarly sympathetic quality and he sang The Heart Bowed Down with excellent effect.


Chicago Musical Times
— The presentation of grand opera was the event of the season.  The individual excellence of the soloists demands special mention, and, for example, that magnificent baritone, Mr. Harold Hunie, who is a finished singer.


Sioux City (Ia.) Journal
— The opera was The Flying Dutchman.  The part of the dutchman (captain of the vessel) was taken by Harold E. Hunie in a way which added to his laurels already won as a pronounced artist, both as interpreter and singer.




GRACE LA VERGNE MILLER



HAROLD E. HUNIE



Bridgeport (Conn.) Standard
— Mrs. Wales has a charm of personality which carries her audience with her.  Each succeeding passage is awaited with eager interest, while her hearers make an unconditional surrender of thoughts of time and place.  In her impersonations she shows a complete comprehension of the eccentricities and whimsicalities of poor human nature.  Not for an instant does she permit her audience to lose sight of the point of the selection.  Future announcements of her appearance will always be greeted with genuine pleasure.


Mannington (W. Va.) Enterprise
— Mrs. Wales was voted the best reader who has ever visited this city and that is saying a good deal.



Scene from A Pair of Lunatics
So you drive about in a balloon, eh?  That must be ripping.


Miss Grace La Vergne Miller began her musical career when as a child she was known as a prodigy pianist.  After developing her powers in this direction, she turned her attention to a naturally beautiful voice, which under able tutors developed into a rare contralto of unusual beauty and richness.  Miss Miller has been a favorite church and concert singer in Chicago for years, with occasional short tours interspersed.  She leaves a large class to become a member of this company, whose success she will help to sustain.


Scene from A Pair of Lunatics
There's rosemary, that's for remembrance.



Leetonia (O.) Reporter
— The twenty-minute comedy was an agreeable departure from the regular line of work done by concert companies.  Mrs. Wales and Mr. Hunie each gave fine examples of good acting which kept the audience in almost continuous laughter during the time of the play.


Scene from Gentleman Jim
Oh, please, let me keep this little locket.  It belonged to my mother.



Muncie (Ind.) Star
— Miss Grace La Vergne Miller has a beautiful voice and an abundance of musical temperament and well deserves the distinction she has attained as a church and concert singer.


Joliet (Ill.) Daily News
— Miss Miller proved herself an accomplished singer, possessing a rich contralto voice, and in addition to this she is a fine pianist.


Decatur (Ind.) Journal
— Miss Grace Miller sang several songs in her charming, cultured manner, proving herself an artist in her chosen profession.


Scene from Gentleman Jim
Oh, please, do go, will you?


PHOTOS BY GIESON, SYKES & FOWLER, MCVICKER'S THEATER BUILDING, CHICAGO



A Pair of Lunatics

Captain Fielding, of the 47th Lancers, and Miss Clara Manners meet by chance at a ball at a lunatic asylum, and, each mistaking the other for an inmate of the place, they try to carry out the roles, thus creating many humorous situations.  The comedy as played by Mrs. Wales and Mr. Hunie is the original English version and contains the Ophelia and Hamlet scene and also the hypnotism act.



Gentleman Jim

In this comedy the humor of the situation also lies in the fact of mistaken identity.  A young lady has been reading of a series of burglaries committed in her neighborhood by a burglar who pursues his vocation always in evening dress, and is therefore called Gentleman Jim.  In her terror she remembers a window having been left open and leaves the room to close it.  In her absence a wealthy young man enters in search of the man who has swindled him out of £ 500.  He mistakes the young lady upon her return for the daughter of this man and proceeds to make his demands for the money, which she, mistaking him for the burglar, endeavors to produce.  Funny situations of course ensue.  This comedy was first played at the Royal Court Theatre, London.



HOLLISTER BROTHERS, ENGRAVERS AND PRINTERS, CHICAGO