[Illustration:  MARIA BARRIENTOS]

Consider for an instant the three first named singers.  They stand at the very top of their profession; they are each and all great in their chosen line, to which they are fitted by reason of their special vocal gifts.  Yet how absolutely different is each from the other!  They cannot even be compared.  They all sing the great florid arias, but each with her own peculiar timbre of voice, her individual nuance and manner of expression.  And it is well this should be so.  We would not have all coloratura singing of the same pattern of sameness or quality, for we find uniformity is monotonous.  There is one peculiar mode of mastery for Galli-Curci, another for Tetrazzini, still another for Barrientos; each in her particular genre is unique, apart.

Perhaps this is especially the case with the Spanish prima donna, Barrientos, who has for several years past come to the Metropolitan for part of the season.  She lives very quietly—­almost in seclusion—­in the great city, keeping very much to herself, with her mother and the members of her household, and does not care to have the simple routine she plans for herself interrupted by any outside demands on her crowded days.

Thus it happens that very few come face to face with the Spanish artist except her personal friends.  But once in a while she breaks the strict rule, and will consent to speak with a serious questioner about her manner of study, how she happened to take up a musical career, also some of the characteristics of her country, its people and its musical art.

As her own art of song is most delicate and pure, as her instrument is the most fragile and ethereal of any of the voices of her class, so the singer herself is of slight and delicate physique.  Her oval face, with its large luminous eyes, has a charm more pronounced than when seen on the other side of the footlights.  Her manner is simple and sincere, in common with that of all great artists.

“Although I always loved singing, I never expected to become a singer,” began Mme. Barrientos, as we were seated on a comfortable divan in her artistic music room.  “As a very young girl, hardly more than a child, my health became delicate.  I had been working very hard at the Royal Conservatory of Music, in Barcelona, my native city, studying piano, violin and theory, also composition.  I was always a delicate child, and the close application required for these studies was too much for me.  Singing was prescribed in order to develop my chest and physique; I took it up as a means of health and personal pleasure, without the slightest idea to what it might lead.

“You speak of the responsibility of choosing a good and reliable vocal instructor.  This is indeed a difficult task, because each teacher is fully persuaded that his method is the only correct one.  But there are so many teachers, and some of them do not even sing themselves at all.  Can you imagine a vocal teacher who cannot sing himself, who is so to say voiceless, unable to demonstrate what he teaches?  A piano or violin teacher must play his instrument, or he will not be able to show the pupils how it ought to be done.  But the vocal teacher thinks to instruct without demonstrating what he is trying to impart.