Memoirs of Clara Louise Kellogg (Mme. Strakosch).
With affection and deepest appreciation of her worth as both a rare woman and a rarer friend I inscribe this record of my public life to Jeannette L. Gilder.
CONTENTS
FOREWORD
CHAPTER 1. MY FIRST NOTES
CHAPTER 2. GIRLHOOD
CHAPTER 3. “LIKE A PICKED CHICKEN”
CHAPTER 4. A YOUTHFUL REALIST
CHAPTER 5. LITERARY BOSTON
CHAPTER 6. WAR TIMES
CHAPTER 7. STEPS OF THE LADDER
CHAPTER 8. MARGUERITE
CHAPTER 9. OPÉRA COMIQUE
CHAPTER 10. ANOTHER SEASON AND A LITTLE MORE SUCCESS
CHAPTER 11. THE END OF THE WAR
CHAPTER 12. AND SO--TO ENGLAND!
CHAPTER 13. AT HER MAJESTY’S
CHAPTER 14. ACROSS THE CHANNEL
CHAPTER 15. MY FIRST HOLIDAY ON THE CONTINENT
CHAPTER 16. FELLOW-ARTISTS
CHAPTER 17. THE ROYAL CONCERTS AT BUCKINGHAM
CHAPTER 18. THE LONDON SEASON
CHAPTER 19. HOME AGAIN
CHAPTER 20. “YOUR SINCERE ADMIRER”
CHAPTER 21. ON THE ROAD
CHAPTER 22. LONDON AGAIN
CHAPTER 23. THE SEASON WITH LUCCA
CHAPTER 24. ENGLISH OPERA
CHAPTER 25. ENGLISH OPERA (Continued)
CHAPTER 26. AMATEURS--AND OTHERS
CHAPTER 27. “THE THREE GRACES”
CHAPTER 28. ACROSS THE SEAS AGAIN
CHAPTER 29. TEACHING AND THE HALF-TALENTED
CHAPTER 30. THE WANDERLUST AND WHERE IT LED ME
CHAPTER 31. PETERSBURG
CHAPTER 32. GOOD-BYE TO RUSSIA--AND THEN?
CHAPTER 33. THE LAST YEARS OF MY PROFESSIONAL CAREER
FOREWORD
The name of Clara Louise Kellogg is known to the immediate generation chiefly as an echo of the past. Yet only thirty years ago it was written of her, enthusiastically but truthfully, that “no living singer needs a biography less than Miss Clara Louise Kellogg; and nowhere in the world would a biography of her be so superfluous as in America, where her name is a household word and her illustrious career is familiar in all its triumphant details to the whole people.”
The past to which she belongs is therefore recent; it is the past of yesterday only, thought of tenderly by our fathers and mothers, spoken of reverently as a poignant phase of their own ephemeral youth, one of their sweet lavender memories. The pity is (although this is itself part of the evanescent charm), that the singer’s best creations can live but in the hearts of a people, and the fame of sound is as fugitive as life itself.
A record of such creations is, however, possible and also enduring; while it is also necessary for a just estimate of the development of civilisations. As such, this record of her musical past--presented by Clara Louise Kellogg herself--will have a place in the annals of the evolution of musical art on the North American continent long after every vestige of fluttering personal reminiscence has vanished down the ages. A word of appreciation with regard to the preparation of this record is due to John Jay Whitehead, Jr., whose diligent chronological labours have materially assisted the editor.
Clara Louise Kellogg came from New England stock of English heritage. She was named after Clara Novello. Her father, George Kellogg, was an inventor of various machines and instruments and, at the time of her birth, was principal of Sumter Academy, Sumterville, S. C. Thus the famous singer was acclaimed in later years not only as the Star of the North (the rôle of Catherine in Meyerbeer’s opera of that name being one of her achievements) but also as “the lone star of the South in the operatic world.” She first sang publicly in New York in 1861 at an evening party given by Mr. Edward Cooper, the brother of Mrs. Abram Hewitt. This was the year of her début as Gilda in Verdi’s opera of Rigoletto at the Academy of Music in New York City. When she came before her countrymen as a singer, she was several decades ahead of her musical public, for she was a lyric artist as well as a singer. (Continued)
advertisement