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Bob’s
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Reviews — The New York Times
From the New York Times - January 24, 1909
A Growing Popular Interest in His
“Salome” and Other Works by the
World-Famous Composer.
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There might be an interesting debate between the champions of Miss Garden and those of Mme. Cavalieri as to which is the more perfect singer, as to whose method approximates the more nearly to the ideal of the “bel canto,” as to whose higher notes are the more pure, delicious, and velvety in quality, the more spontaneous and limpid in delivery. There might be a public contest, and such a contest would fill the Manhattan Opera House at advanced prices quite as full as “Salome” will do it. But Miss Garden’s solicitude was not so much about the kind of singing Mme. Cavalieri would introduce into “Thaïs.” It was for the French dramatic traditions that she trembled. She objected to having an Italian artist sing French parts. It is nothing that Mme. Cavalieri professes to have sung Thaïs in Paris before Miss Garden did. Miss Garden “knows how the French school should be interpreted.” The implication is that Mme. Cavalieri does not, though she does not say anything so cruel. Yet it may be true. What Miss Garden seems to have established by her recent revolt is a sort of copyright in French opera. “I brought the opera to America and feel that I alone in this country have the right to appear in it,” is the way Miss Garden phrases it. This sort of copyright, we believed, is the ingenious phrase of one of O. Henry’s delightful rascals: It is a “non-illegal” copyright.Last updated December 29, 2006