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The Rose Company was a major postcard producer. Among
the postcards they produced were two beautiful 3-image sets --- one of
opera personalities and one of actors. They were published in
1906-07 and made of quality heavy stock with gold edges. The opera cards
can be distinguished from the actor cards by the inclusion of a bar of
music in the center of the card. Both sets have signature facsimiles.
These cards are difficult to find and command a high price. |
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(1) Alessandro Bonci
(Cesena, Italy: 2 Feb 1870 - Viserba, Italy: 10 Aug 1940), Italian tenor. He
made his stage debut (1896) at Parma as Fenton in Falstaff. He
appeared all over the world, including the first ever performance at the
Manhattan Opera in NY (Arturo, 1906). He was specifically hired by
Hammerstein to counteract the performances of Caruso at the Metropolitan
Opera. However, after one season there he jumped ship in favor of the Met.
He appeared at the Met from 1907 - 1910. There is a theater named after him
in his birth town of Cesena, Italy.
(2) Emma Eames [Story]: American (born
in Shanghai) soprano (13 Aug 1865 - 13 Jun 1952): Debut Paris 1889
(Juliette, chosen by Gounod). Created Colombe (Ascanio), title role
in De la Nux's Zaire. Seen here as Aida and Tosca.
(3) Swedish-American [mezzo] soprano Olive
Fremstad (1871-1951). She sang the title role in Salome in the
scandalous U.S. premiere of that work at the Metropolitan Opera in 1907. It
was subsequently banned from the repertory and did not reappear at that
house until 1934. Seen here as Venus and Carmen.
(4) Johanna
Gadski [Emilia Agnes]: German soprano (15 Jun 1872
- 22 Feb 1932): Debut Berlin (Kroll Opera) 1889 as Undine. Damrosch Company,
London CG, Met. Left America when her husband was deported for his German
connections. Bayreuth, Munich. Seen here as 'Brunhilde' and Aida.
(5) Bohemian, later American, contralto
Ernestine Schumann-Heink (1861-1936). Her concert debut took
place in Graz at the age of fifteen in a performance of Beethoven's Ninth
Symphony. Only two years later she made her operatic debut as Azucena
(Il Trovatore) at the Dresden Royal Opera. In 1926, to commemorate the
fiftieth anniversary of her singing debut in Graz, she performed to a packed
house at Carnegie Hall. Seen here as Waltraute and Erda.
(6) American contralto Josephine Jacoby
(1875-1948) spent the majority of her operatic career at the Metropolitan
Opera (1903-08), making only occasional operetta and concert appearances
thereafter. She was one of the unfortunate Metropolitan singers who was on
tour in San Francisco during the great earthquake and fire of 1906. Unlike
some of her companions, she was able to return to her Palace Hotel room long
enough to gather her jewelry and dress more fully; however, she only managed
to slip her feet into Frasquita's gold slippers, which she wore only hours
before in a performance of Carmen. Seen here as Stephano and Siebel.
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(7)
French bass Marcel Journet (1867-1933) is shown here in Le Prophète
and Carmen. An accomplished singer and actor, he was admired throughout
his career, which spanned more than four decades. He sang in the world
premiere of Boito's Nerone. His American premieres included Salome,
Parsifal, and De Lara's Messaline. His versatility was in
evidence by his mastery of over 60 roles in the French repertory, 27 Italian
roles, and all of the principal Wagner basso roles. Copyright 1906.
(8) Helen Mapleson. The passage here is
from Meistersinger. She had a small operatic career. Among her
performances was an 1902 appearance (as Leuconöe) in Messaline at the
Academy of Music in Philadelphia with the Metropolitan Opera company.
(9) American mezzo-soprano Marie Mattfeld
began her singing career in 1897 with the Damrosch-Ellis Opera Company which
boasted a roster consisting of Nordica, Melba, Bispham, Gadski, Campanari,
Fischer and Kraus. In 1901 she joined the Metropolitan Opera. She specialized
in supporting roles, singing with some of the greatest singers of that era.
She logged nearly 900 performances during her twenty-two seasons there.
Mattfeld is shown here as Hänsel which she performed 76 times, and the
Shepherd in Tannhäuser, which she sang only 4 times. Her most performed
role, which was vocally unlike either of these, was that of Turridu's mother,
Lucia, in Cavalleria Rusticana. Copyright 1907.
(10) [Dame] Nellie Melba [orig. Helen
Mitchell]: Australian soprano (19 May 1861 - 23 Feb 1931). Studied with
Marchesi. Debut (1887) at the Brussels Opera as Gilda (Rigoletto).
Created title role in Hélène at Monte Carlo. Appearances at Covent
Garden, La Scala, The Met, Paris Opéra, Chicago. Seen here as Marguerite and
Violetta. (11) Adolf
Muhlmann. Seen here as Gunther and the Flying Dutchman.
(12) Pol Plançon: French bass (12
Jun 1854 - 11 Aug 1914): Debut at Lyons (1877) as St. Bris in Les
Huguenots. World premiere of Le Cid. La Scala, Met, London CG,
Brussels, Nice, Paris Opéra. Seen here in Mephistopheles and
The Huguenots. (13)
German tenor Albert Reiss (1870-1940) was an actor before he turned to
music. His voice was discovered by Bernhard Pollini and Ernestine
Schumann-Heink. He was an admired buffo tenor who was seen at the
Metropolitan Opera for eighteen seasons (1901-1919), where he was the
Broommaker in the world premiere of Königskinder (28 Dec 1910). Those
who are inclined to believe that all witches should be female should note that
Reiss played the Witch in Hänsel und Gretel thirty times at the
Metropolitan! Reiss logged over 1,000 performances at the Metropolitan, and
his career there might have been extended had he not had a petty backstage
argument with management. Seen here as David and Mime.
(14) Marcella Sembrich: Polish soprano (15
Feb 1858 - 11 Jan 1935): Debut (1877) as Elvira (I Puritani) in Athens.
Dresden Royal Opera, Met, Paris, Milan, Berlin, Vienna, Stockholm, Brussels.
Equally adept with the piano and violin and often accompanied herself. One of
the most famous coloratura sopranos in operatic history. Seen here in The
Daughter of the Regiment and as Mimi.
(15) Arturo Vigna. Vigna was a conductor
at the Metropolitan Opera. He conducted the first Metropolitan Opera
performance of Madama Butterfly on 11 Feb 1907, with Farrar, Homer,
Caruso and Scotti. (16)
Marion Weed. American (Rochester, NY) [mezzo] soprano. She studied
with Lilli Lehmann. She was principally a Wagnerian singer, performing in
Bayreuth, Hamburg, and Cologne before making her debut (28 Nov 1903) as
Brünnhilde at the Met. She was also Gertrude in the first Met performance of
Hänsel und Gretel (25 Nov 1905). Seen here as Kundry.
(17) William H. Crane (Leicester, MA: 30
Apr 1845 - Hollywood, CA: 7 Mar 1928), theater. Well know for his stage role
as David Harum, which he recreated in a silent film of the same name in 1915.
This is an example of a Rose Company theater-themed postcard. It's quite
similar to the opera cards but it doesn't have the musical excerpt.
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