of the Metropolitan Opera House, for instance, make a
company of at least two leading conductors, twelve assistant conductors,
about ninety soloists, a chorus numbering at least one hundred and
twenty-five singers, thirty musicians for stage music, about twenty
stage attendants and an orchestra of from eighty to one hundred
performers, to say nothing of the costume, scenic and business staff,
making a little industry all in itself.

The General Director, the Stage Manager, and often the Musical Director
make innumerable suggestions to the singers regarding the proper
histrionic presentation of their roles. As a rule singers give too
little attention to the dramatic side of their work and demand too much
of the stage manager. In recent years there has been a great improvement
in this. Prior to the time of Gluck, Weber and Wagner, acting in opera
was a matter of ridicule.

THE BALLET

About seventy or one hundred persons make up the ballet of a modern
grand opera. At least ten years of continuous study are required to make
a finished ballet dancer in the histrionic sense. Many receive very
large fees for their services. The art of stage dancing also has
undergone many great reforms in recent years; and the ballets of to-day
are therefore much more popular than they were in the latter part of the
last century. The most popular ballets of to-day are the _Coppelia_ and
_Sylvia_ of Delibes. The ballets from the operas of _La Gioconda_,
_Samson et Delila_, _Armide_, _Mephistophele_, _Aida_, _Orfeo_,
_L'Africaine_, and _The Damnation of Faust_ also are very popular.

At a modern opera house like the Metropolitan in New York City the
number of employees will be between six hundred and seven hundred, and
the cost of a season will be about one million dollars.

FRANCES ALDA

(MME. GIULIO GATTI-CASAZZA)

BIOGRAPHICAL

Mme. Frances Alda was born at Christ Church, New Zealand, May 31st,
1883. She was educated at Melbourne and studied singing with Mathilde
Marchesi in Paris. Her debut was made in Massenet's _Manon_, at the
Opera Comique in Paris in 1904. After highly successful engagements in
Paris, Brussels, Parma and Milan (where she created the title role in
the Italian version of _Louise_), she made her American debut at the
Metropolitan Opera House in New York as Gilda in Verdi's _Rigoletto_.
Since her initial success in New York she has been connected with the
Metropolitan stage every season. In 1910 she marr