Music: Opera Notes

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In Chicago. It is rapidly becoming a convention for the critics of Chicago to hail every week as a great artist some singer hitherto ungraced by U.S. laurels. Two weeks ago it was Baritone Bonelli. Last week it was Luella Melms, coloratura singer, born in Appleton, Wis. She made her debut in Rigoletto. Staid people have been foolish enough to believe that a mod ern audience could not be more than politely moved by the graceful insipidities of the old score-that the days were past when a perfect trill was a signal for young men in evening clothes to unhitch the horses of a prima donna's carriage and pull her home themselves. The Chicago enthusiasts stopped short of this. But they held up the performance after she had sung the "Caro Nome," and gave Luella Melius ten curtain calls at the end of the act. Old Critic Glenn Dillard Gunn declared that he remembered only three such scenes in the last 25 years; others compared Miss Melius with Gali-Curci. Even the most reserved could not help agreeing that her voice is very good.

In Manhattan. Basso Feodor Chaliapin came back to the Metropolitan as a guest artist in Boris, sang superbly, blew kisses to the gallery from the tips of his enormous fingers, went away to drink a glass of Chianti with friends.

A sore ailment, described on the programs as "indisposition," smote Tenor Beniamino Gigli just before he was to appear as Vasco da Gama in L'Africaine. Mario Chamlee sprang into the breach. Without rehearsal, without ever having appeared in the role on any stage, he sang it resonantly, fluently, confidently.