Still another delightful dramatic soprano from the land of Jenny Lind is Sigrid Arnoldson, who has a beautiful voice, winning personality, and pronounced musical intelligence.  She is still in her prime.

When the name of Adelina Patti is mentioned, we always think of long enduring vocal powers, many farewells and high prices.  Catalani, in her full splendor, earned about $100,000 a season.  Malibran’s profits for eighty-five concerts at La Scala ran to $95,000.  Jenny Lind received $208,675 for ninety-five concerts under Barnum’s management.  Patti has had as much as $8,395 for one performance, and long received a fee of $5,000 a night.  In coloratura roles she has been pronounced the greatest singer of her time, both in opera and concert.  Her voice, noted for its wide compass, exceeding sweetness, marvelous flexibility and perfect equality, has been so wonderfully well cared for that even now, in her sixtieth year, she enjoys singing, although she rarely appears in public.  Her sister, Carlotta, was also a coloratura vocalist of exquisite technique.

Queens of song now pass in swift review before the mind’s eye.  We recall Marietta Alboni, the greatest contralto of the middle of the last century, with a voice rich, mellow, liquid, pure and endowed with passionate tenderness, the only pupil of Rossini; Theresa Tietiens, with her mighty dramatic soprano, whose tones were softer than velvet, and her noble acting; Marie Piccolomini, a winning mezzo-soprano; Parepa Rosa, with her sweet, strong voice and imposing stage presence; Pescha Leutner, the star of 1856; Louisa Pyne, the English Sontag; Parodi, pupil of Pasta; Etelka Gerster, whose beautiful soprano could fascinate if it could not awe; Pauline Lucca, whose originality, artistic temperament and intelligence placed her in the front rank of dramatic sopranos, and many others.

Amalie Materna, dramatic soprano at the Vienna Court Theatre from 1869 to 1896, with great musical and dramatic intelligence, with a voice of remarkable compass, volume, richness and sustaining power, vibrant with passionate intensity, and with a noble stage presence, proved to be Wagner’s ideal Bruennhilde and introduced the role at Bayreuth in 1876.  She was also the creator of Kundry at the same place in 1882.  She aroused unbounded enthusiasm as Elizabeth in “Tannhaeuser,” and as Isolde in “Tristan and Isolde.”  She is not forgotten by those who heard her in various cities of this country.

The same may be said of Marianne Brandt, who sang the part of Kundry at the second “Parsifal” representation at Bayreuth, having been Frau Materna’s alternate in 1882.  With her superbly rich, deep-toned voice and her splendid vocal and dramatic control she thrilled her audiences in her Wagnerian roles, in Beethoven’s “Fidelio,” and in all she attempted, whether in opera or concert.  She was a magnificent horsewoman, and was perhaps the only Bruennhilde who was able to give full play on the stage to her Valkyrie charger.  It is told