Variety (March 1955)

68 CONCERTS-OPEBA Wednesday, March 30, 1955 TV Gives It ‘ Washington, March 29. “With rare arid almost freakish exceptions, opera has never paid its way and, alt far as I can see, never will,” Rudolph Bing, Met Qpera general manager,, said here last week. Addressing a luncheon of • the National Press Club, Bing added; “It always amuses me when people ask whether, by any chance, I am for subsidy.” He continued that there has never been any opera anywhere able to "exist for a length of time without subsidy. He said that while subsidy here is in the form of admissions tax exemption and contributions by wealthy friends, Governmental subsidies keep such operations as Italy's La Scala, the Vienna Staatsoper, £ov- ent Garden in London, etc.,, going. He pointed out that La Scala and the West Berlin Opera receive the equivalent of $1,000,000 annually in Government subsidies. The difficulty in developing American bperatic talent, said Bing, is that “only a regrettably small number of them can make a living as professional pe-formers in opera.” TV, he added, has opened up some opportunities, “yet really not too many.” “Since as the mass, medium par excellence,” he continued, “tele- vision must at all times address itself to the greatest number, it has not as yet given to opera more than a cursory glance, for obvious- ly opera is not as yet an attraction like ‘Peter Pan’ that can deliver 60,000,000 viewers in front of the television sets. . . . You can easily see that an occasional appearance in television opera and a few in- frequent engagements to sing in a concert performance of opera are not enough for a young singer to get along.” ‘Stubborn Conservatism* Commenting on the criticism that the Met brings only “unimagi- native, old-fashioned programs” to cities on its annual tour route, Bing explained: “What these critics do not know or conveniently chose to overlook is that very often the local program is not chosen by the Metropolitan Opera management but rather by local committees, that there is often staggering lack of stage facil- ities, and — the most important point—the stubborn conservatism of opera-going publics everywhere. It is only natural that any local committee or manager, faced with the inevitable enormous cost of iinporting the Metropolitan, must be eager to sell out the house. This can be done with the stand- ard works only, and let no one tell you differently. “Our books are there to prove ihy case. We play certain cities where we can sell out such works as ‘Carmen’ or ‘Boheme’ to 10,000 people in one evening. Yet, when in some of these cities we played great but less known wdrks, such as Mussorgsky's ‘Boris Godunov’ or Verdi’s ‘La Forza del Destino,’ tick- ets went begging by the hundreds, not to^say thousands.” NEW HISPANO DANCE CO. WITH U.S. IMPRESARIOS Paris, March 29. Tom Van Dycke, roving Variety niugg.N and Ben Carlin, ex-manager of the Marquis de Cuevas Ballet, have formed a Hispano dance group called Danzas Ibericas. Com- posed of seven people, troupe is headed by Jose and Dolores Fer- nandez. Fernandez is choreogra- pher and has previously worked with the New York City Ballet. Outfit opens in Lille in April and then takes a three-month break-in tour of France before heading for Paris for a stint at the Theatre Des Champs Elysees. A U.S. tour is also in the offing. Others are dancer Lutyo De Luz, an ex-Cuevas member, pianist Miguel De Velasco and guitarists Pablo Gonzalez and Gitanas, with flamenco singer Manola Leiva. Rep will be composed of both classical and popular Hispano dances. Gigli Set for 3 N.lfe Dates In ‘Farewell’ Return Two N. Y. recitals of Beniamino Gigli, skedded for Carnegie Hall April 17 and 24, were sold out by last week, as result of one ad, and a third has been set fbr April 20. The onetime Met Opera 1 tenor, who celebrated his 65th birthday last week by closing a “farewell” concert tour of England in- Man- chester, is due in N. Y. April 12. Handled .by Columbia Artists Mgt., Gigli is being presented in N. Y. by Joseph H. Conlin Jr. Lat- ter went abroad last week to hear Gigli in concert, and then headed for Paris and Rome to scout more talent. He’s due back in N. Y. April 4. Gigli is making his first N. Y. concert appearance since 1939, also announcing the three dates as his American “farewell.” Tailchief Won’t Rejoin Ballet Russe Company On Its 2d Tour Season Maria Tailchief, wlio Joined the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo as its star when the touring troupe was reactivated this season, won't re- turn to the company next season. She’s going back to the N.Y. City Ballet, with which she’s been con- nected since its inception in 1948, until , this year’s leave of absence. Difficulties involved in traveling, as well as disagreement with Bal- let Russe general director Serge Denham on distribution of roles, are believed reasons for the bal- lerina’s decision. One of the highest-paid dancers in the toe-and-tutu field at $1,000 a week (not $2,000, as widely re- puted), .and admittedly Ballet Russe’s biggest drdw, Miss Tall- chief will return to the NYCB at a probable $300 a week. At the moment, she’s out of terping, for two weeks, with a' hurt ankle. She finishes with Ballet Russe April 19 and will fly immediately to Eu- rope, to join the NYCB (which will already be there). N.Y. troupe, do- ing a three-month overseas tour, returns July 8, to go to the Coast for a summer of engagements. ESCUDERO 5 V 2 G, DETROIT, Detroit, March 29. Escudero grossed a poor $5,500 at the 2,050-seat Shubert last week. Top was $3.30. Current is “Guys and Dolls.” U.S. Talent Skedded For First Genoa Danee Fest Genoa, March 22. Genoa’s first International Dance Festival has been set for the City Park at Nervi,, seven miles from here, from June 22 to Aug. 5. Di- rectors are Ugo dell’ Ara and Mario Porcile. New Yorkers Dale Wasserman and Trudy Goth will be in charge of production and special lighting, and public relations, re- spectively, with Armando Aliberti as conductor. Alicia Markova and partner will inaugurate the fest. John Butler & Co., from N. Y., will appear July 22 ,- 25 . Others participating include Harald Kreutzberg, Royal Danish Ballet, Yugoslav National Ballet, Grand Ballet du Marquis de Cuevas and Azuma Kabuki Co. Last-named will close the fest July 30-Aug. 5. ^ Mpls. 0rch’s269G Drive To Offset’55-’56 Red Minneapolis, March 29. Annual drive for Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra funds started last week/ ‘with goal set at $269,000, to offset expected deficits. Budget estimates ’for 1 the 1955-56 season include $148,300 in boxoffice re- ceipts from Ideal concerts, &n addi- tional $110,000 in tour receipts, and some $40,500 from miscella- neous sources, including record- ings. Cost of producing the home con- certs is- expected to be $£141,000 next season. Tour expenses are es- timated at $75,000, with $43,000 projected for administrative ex- penses and $109,000 for operating expenses. Tucker Deal Snarls Toscy ‘Aida’ Release , On 1949 Broadcast RCA Victor has been having great success with its recordings of the concert versions of operas originally broadcast by Arturo Toscanini and the NBC Symphony. Latest, issued this month, is Verdi’s “Masked Ball.” Several of the releases have been held up for some time by Toscy, for technical or artistic reasons. In some cases he did minor re-recording or touch- ing up, then okayed them. Broadcast of Verdi’s “Alda,” aired in March, 1949, with Herva Nelli in the title role, and Richard Tucker, Norman Scott, Giuseppe Valdengo and Eva Gustafson as the other leads, has never been re- leased. Two weeks ago, Victor finally got Toscy’s okay. But' the disk company slipped Up in not signing all the artists involved, and can’t release the recording. Tucker won’t agree. The Met tenor has signed to do a recording of “Aida” next summer at La Scala for Angel Records, and won’t okay the Toscy release. In- cidentally, it’s the only opera in the Toscy series that he’s ap- peared in. \ Marks Levine, prez of National Concert & Artists Corp., back at his desk after a nine-week lapse, due to illness. Ronald Wise, ex-RCA Victor and Decca, and for the last three years with Mercury Records in'sales and sales promotion, resigned from Merc last week. Elmer Wiener off to Cleveland to - handle press for Met Opera week’s engagement, opening April 11. It’s the 12th such chore -for Wiener, who is on leave of_absence from road-booking chores for the indie concert bureaus, Friedberg Mgt. and Herbert Barrett Mgt. Wanda Landowska, famed 76- year-old harpsichordist, who’s been busy doing recordings, will make her only concert appearance this season at the Metropolitan .Mu- seum of Art, N. Y., tomorrow (Thurs.). Pianist Vladimir Horowitz, who did no concertizing this year be- cause of illness, is huddling with his manager, David Libidins, on bookings for next season. He did some recordings over the past few months. Martial Singher and BohUslav Martinu have joined the faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music, Phil- adelphia, to begin teaching in OCr tober. Inside Stuff The Paganini Quartet will wind up a tour on April 4 that’s con- sidered unprecedented for highbrow four-player music. Group, in its third year with Columbia Artists Mgt., will have filled 78 dates (a mark only equaled by the Budapest Quartet, which' includes its many New York area concerts). Of the 78 dates, 61 were with Col’s Community Concerts division, a surprisingly large number of “culture’ bookings for that mass-audience circuit. Tradesters point to certain marks of showmanship in the Paganini Quartet programs, unfamiliar to orthodox quartet-playing, to accounl for the bookings and draw. The first violin, Henri Temianka, also acts as an emcee, explaining the music to be played, the rare Stradivari the men use which were once owned by Paganini, etc. Also, RCA Victoi has issued an album, “Heart of the String Quartet,” recorded by the Paganini group, and containing eight popular movements from eight different quartets. The* Quartet plays these selections as the second part of it$ program, the short numbers sometimes taking on the form of a recital for solo violin and strings. The Met Opera has about set the cast for its opener next season- “Tales of Hoffmann” on Nov. 14—with Roberta Peters as Olympic Rise Stevens the Giulietta, Mildred Miller as Niclaus, Richard Tucke the Hoffman, and Martial Singher doing four roles (magician, etc. Cyril Ritchard, legit actor-director, who staged the Met’s “Barber c Seville,” will put this one on, with Pierre Monteux conducting. It 1 ratjier unusual for a mezzo (Miss Stevens) to sing Giulietta. • »*.*. (••>», a *4 * vi - c a«,. i./rcu , ft.-q.;- • g ' . An Object Lesson? Recent Variety story about a Spanish dance company which got rave notices in N. Y. and on the road, but wound up a 20-week U. S. tour close to $125,000 in the red, has excited an unusual amount of attention in the trade. The head of one concert bureau, seeing in it an object lesson, pasted up the story, wrote a lengthy commentary beside it, and sent it around as a confidential memo to all the bureau's, execs, to be read and initialed.* Memo read, in part, as follows: “TO ALL EXECUTIVES. It’s been confirmed to me that the loss on the attraction referred to herein was in excess of $100,000. So it behooves us to. examine why an attraction which got such wonderful notices in New York could sustain such a loss so that we do not make a similar mistake. N “It is very clear, that we have to use our own judgment and. not that of critics, when we put Up the company’s money. Basi^ rea- sons for the loss of $100,000 on this show are: 1. Pretense that it was a New York attraction. Half the money lost was lost by playing four weeks in New York when one week was enough; in fact, three days was enough. Similar mistakes were . made in other places where the company was booked for a week, notably Botson and Chicago. In one of these cities it actually had the nerve to play against Jose Greco, with disas- trous results. 2. The cost of the orchestra raised the price of the attraction to more than it was worth in entertainment value. 3. Finally, the attraction played 21 weeks when the maximum it should have played was 14. “Had the company played 14 weeks with two pianos, instead of 21 'weeks with an orchestra, the loss would have been '■trifling, if any.” * Other managers feel differently. One, agreeing that no Span- ish ballet needs an orchestra, gave as his reasons for the flop: (a) the troupe’s N. Y. chances were killed off by another troupe rushed in hurriedly ahead, of them, scaring away people who didn’t know this was a different company; (b) troupe should have taken out huge ads the day after the opening to run excerpts front the rave reviews, as the legiters do; (c) troupe was too big, and over- produced—a Spanish dance company is not a ballet company, and (d) no Spanish ballet needs an orch. With 240G Take (or 16-Week Tour Backhaus, at 72, Set For 20 U.S. Dates in 1956 Wilhelm Backhaus will be back in the U.S. next season for a tour, appearing with eight symphony orchs, as well as doing from 10 to. 12 recitals. The German pianist, who will be 72, will open his tour with the Buffalo Symphony Feb. 5-7, wind- ing his visit with a Carnegie Hall, N. Y., recital April 11. Herbert Barrett is managing. Longhair Disk Reviews Puccini: Manon Lescaut (Lon- don). Another operatic hit in Lon- don’s growing, repertoire, with its surefire stars, Renata Tebaldi -and Mario del Monaco, gracing an artistic, smooth-flowing, version of the lovely, melodious opus. Fer- nando Corena also stands out (as Geronte), while maestro Francesco Molinari-Pradelli reins Santa Cece- lia orch and chorus forcefully. Rachmaninoff: Concerto No. 2\ (Capitol). Vigorous, fresh per- formance of the w.k. work, full of romantic spirit. Leonard Pennario is a gifted young pianist, and the St. Louis Symph under Vladimir Golschmann backs up sensitively. Charpentier: Impressions of Italy & Aubert: La Habanera (Angel). Youthful Charpentier suite is fra- grant, evocative and very colorful. Aubert ■ symphonic poem is alter- nately pleasant or disturbed, but appealing. Good interpretations by the Paris Opera Orch under Four- estier. Mendelssohn: Symphonies No. 4 & 9 (RCA Victor). The gay “Ital- ian” (No. 4) and serious “Reforma- tion” in vivid, spirited readings by the NBC Symph under Arturo Tos- canini. Definitive disk. Mozart: Serenades No. 11, E Flat & No. 12, € Minor for Winds (MGM). Simple, melodic, attrac- tive serenades for winds, played in proper spirit by an ensemble under Arthur Winograd. Strauss: Symphony For Wind In- struments (Decca). A iate work by the late master, this is a pleasant, ornamental, baroque piece quite properly (and skillfully) played by the London Baroque Ensemble un- der Karl Haas. Liszt: Hungarian Fantasy & Rhapsody No. 2 (Decca). Clean, somewhat refined performance of the Fantasy by a skilled pianist, Julian von Khrolyi, with the Munich Philharmonic. Rhapsody also satisfies. Handel: Water Music (London). Complete version of the 18 move- ments here, the formal, classical work getting a graceful, pleasing, energetic performance by the Boyd Neel Orch, under Neel. • ■ The Robert Shaw Chorale is winding up its first year for Colum- bia Artists Mgt. Sunday (3), com- pleting what’s regarded as the big- gest money tour of the current season for a strictly concert at- traction (as against ballet, symph, etc.). In 16 weeks (10 In the fall, six in winter), the company of 42 will have racked up a gross of $240,000, Troupe is 92% booked already for the ’55-’56 season by Col’s Cop- picus, Schang & Brown division. In addition, next year’s trek won’t be a transcontinental one, like this year’s, but limited to the east as far as Texas, making the virtual booking sellout that much more unusual. Unit sells for around $3,000, with Col claiming it’s as popular with schools and colleges as it is with concert courses and series. Next season’s tour will conclude in mid-March to enable 'the group to go overseas. It will play abroad for 10 weeks, in Europe and the Near East. Antioch Sued for $13,800; Claim Festival Runout Yellow Springs, O., March 29. Antioch College has been name'll defendant in a lawsuit over an al- legedly cancelled music festival by Jeunesses Musicales USA, New York, which seeks $13,800 in dam- ages for expensed incurred in plan- ning a festival at Antioch in June 1954, 1955 and 1956. In its petition in Common Pleas Court at Xenia, O., the group claims the college withdrew from the festival and conferences after a considerable amount in expenses had been spent, and in violation of the contract. Only, comment from the college was by W. B. Alexander, vice-presi- dent, who said “the college knows of no basis for a just claim against it by this organization.’’ Bliz Blitzes Tor. Orch Flint, Mich., March 29. A 24-year tradition of the Toron- to Symphony was broken last week when a blizzard forced cancellation of a concert at Bay City. Orch got off the train here, but “was unable to bus to Bay City because of im- passable roads. Sir Ernest MacMillan said it was first time a concert was cancelled Since he became conductor in 1931. GRECO 18G f FRISCO San Francisco, March 29. Jose Greco and his Spanish dance company did $18,000 in their first week at the Geary Theatre. Show is scaled at $3.85 top and is in for 11 days. { 1