Recording Activities and Final Performances
In the same year (1912) as her Australian tour, Kirkby Lunn recorded two duets with the famous Covent Garden and Met tenor, John McCormack, from operas composed by Wolf-Ferrari. These duets have been re-mastered and re-issued on CD, as have some of her other, solo, 78-rpm discs. Her main body of her recordings were made for the Gramophone Company between 1909 and 1916 but there were also Pathe records cut earlier, including duets that feature Ben Davies, another tenor. Among the operatic excerpts on her recorded output are music by Wagner and, as we have seen, Verdi, Ponchielli, Gluck, Mozart and Wolf-Ferrari. The acoustic recording process of the day was not particularly kind to Kirkby-Lunn's "warm rich notes of true contralto quality" (as critic Herman Klein spoke of her voice), although in some pieces such as the Gounod 'Entreat me not to leave thee', or the Arthur Goring Thomas 'A Summer night', her famed control of the broad compass, and the poise and grandeur of her delivery, are apparent.
In 1919–22, Kirkby Lunn reappeared at Covent Garden, choosing her celebrated part of Kundry for her last appearances there with the British National Opera Company. After this she remained before the public for several years more in concert and recital. (At much the same time, Marie Brema was making her reappearances in Orfeo.)
Read more about this topic: Louise Kirkby Lunn
Famous quotes containing the words recording, activities, final and/or performances:
“I didn’t have to think up so much as a comma or a semicolon; it was all given, straight from the celestial recording room. Weary, I would beg for a break, an intermission, time enough, let’s say, to go to the toilet or take a breath of fresh air on the balcony. Nothing doing!”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)
“There is, I think, no point in the philosophy of progressive education which is sounder than its emphasis upon the importance of the participation of the learner in the formation of the purposes which direct his activities in the learning process, just as there is no defect in traditional education greater than its failure to secure the active cooperation of the pupil in construction of the purposes involved in his studying.”
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““If I hit him, he’ll hit me too,” Anton Petrovich thought in a flash. He pulled off the glove with a final yank and threw it awkwardly at Berg. The glove slapped against the wall and dropped into the washstand pitcher.
“Good shot,” said Berg.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“This play holds the season’s record [for early closing], thus far, with a run of four evening performances and one matinee. By an odd coincidence it ran just five performances too many.”
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