Paid Hands

Wartime prosperity reared its bejewelled head in Manhattan's Metropolitan Opera House last week. The new season opened with less than its usual quota of mink and diamonds, with slightly less than its usual quota of artistic quality, but with a record quota of enthusiasm. The newly prosperous, aided and abetted by soldiers and sailors on leave, not only jampacked the plush and gilt auditorium but indulged in ecstasies of applause. In fact, during the second night's Don Giovanni, indiscriminate applause became such a problem that Conductor George Szell had to shush his audience with threatening gestures.

Old operagoers, who know when to clap and when not to, were scandalized. Most indignant of all were the 50-odd members of the Metropolitan's claque, whose carefully timed outbursts were swamped in the generally undisciplined enthusiasm.

The Indispensables. All the world's great opera houses have claques, and the Met's is typical. Directed by a chief and a staff of skilled lieutenants, it is composed of ham-handed waiters, barbers and ex-musicians who stand at strategically dispersed positions at the back of the audience and, at a signal from their leaders, loose a barrage of claps and bravos. The claque is paid by the Metropolitan's singers, who provide free admission and pay from $5 for a mild flurry of handclapping to $25 for a deafening furor. The late Enrico Caruso, a liberal patron, never sang without the help of a claque. In the days of Impresario Giulio Gatti- Casazza, the chief of the Met's claque, a hardy Italian named Harold Lodovichetti, described himself on his business cards as "Promoter of Enthusiasm." The claque's present leader is a more conservative man, who lives in The Bronx and is known under the varied names of Schultz and Bennett. The Metropolitan switchboard keeps his telephone number on file for such artists as desire his services. And when the Met goes on tour, the resourceful Mr. Schultz-Bennett goes along to raise teams of local applauders.

Though it is often deplored by unrealistic opera-lovers, the claque is almost as indispensable to a great opera house like the Metropolitan as a well-trained chorus or orchestra. For the paid applauders know precisely when to do their stuff--and thus set the audience a well-mannered example. When a booming aria comes to a thrilling finish, and is then succeeded by a delicate orchestral postscript or a bit of crucial drama, a well-trained claque can hold the audience in check until the proper moment, then lead it into a crescendo of enthusiasm.

The Newcomers. Last week both claque and audience found several things worth applauding. One was the singing of the great Italian bass, Ezio Pinza; as Mephistopheles and as Don Giovanni, he proved again that he is the Metropolitan's brightest star. Another was the expert conducting of Hungarian-born George Szell, who, since the departure of Sir Thomas Beecham and Bruno Walter, is the Met's finest maestro. During the opening week six young U.S. singers made their first Metropolitan appearances. Of them, the likeliest future headliners seemed to be:

FLORENCE KIRK, Philadelphia-born dramatic soprano, who sang Donna Anna in Don Giovanni with a few vocal wobbles, but who acted it like an attractive conflagration.

MARTHA LIPTON, native New Yorker, who looked well in tights and warbled warmly as Siebel in Faust.

HUGH THOMPSON, son of veteran New York Sun Critic Oscar Thompson, who gave unusual sparkle to the minor part of Schaunard in La Boheme. Commented his father next day: "His voice is a good one ..."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.