Il Barbiere_. After that year she sang
pretty steadily at the Metropolitan until February 6, 1909, when, at
the age of 51 (or lacking nine days of it), she bid farewell to the
New York opera stage in acts from several of her favourite operas. She
subsequently sang in a few performances of opera in Europe and was
heard in song recital in America. When she left the opera house she
had no rival in vocal artistry; and she had so satisfactorily solved
the problems of style in singing certain kinds of songs that she also
surveyed the field of song recital from a mountain top.... But such a
singer as Mme. Sembrich, who made her appeal through the expression of
the milder emotions, who never, indeed, attempted to touch dramatic
depths, even style, in the end, will not assist. Magnificent Lilli
Lehmann might make a certain effect in _Gotterdammerung_ so long as
she had a leg to stand on or a note to croak, but an adequate delivery
of _Der Nussbaum_ or _Wie Melodien_ demands a vocal control which a
singer past middle age is not always sure of possessing.... After a
long retirement, Mme. Sembrich gave a concert at Carnegie Hall,
November 21, 1915. The house was crowded and the applause at the
beginning must almost have unnerved the singer, who walked slowly
towards the front of the platform as the storm burst and then bowed
her head again and again. Her program on this occasion was not one of
her best. She had not chosen familiar songs in which to return to her
public. This may in a measure account for her lack of success in
always calling forth steady tones. However, on the whole, her voice
sounded amazingly fresh. Her high notes especially rang true and
resonant as ever. Her middle voice showed wear. Her style remained
impeccable, unrivalled.... She announced, following this concert, a
series of four recitals in a small hall and actually appeared at one
of them. This time I did not hear her, but I am told that her voice
refused to respond to her wishes. Nor was the hall filled. The
remaining concerts were abandoned. "Mme. Sembrich has never been a
failure and she is too old to begin now!" she is reported to have said
to a friend.

Emma Calve's date of birth is recorded as 1864 in some of the musical
dictionaries. This would make her 53 years old. Her singing of the
_Marseillaise_ a year ago at the Allies Bazaar at the Grand Central
Palace proved to me that her retirement from the Opera was premature.
Her performances at the Man