USA > Maine > Cumberland County > Portland > Portland city guide > Part 22
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Portland's Harry Mclellan, composer, organist, and choirmaster, studied with George W. Marston of Portland, with various New York teachers, and in Germany. He became choirmaster of Grace Church in Bath, a mem- ber of the choir of the Church of The Heavenly Rest in New York City, and was the first director of the Mendelssohn Society of Bath. Among his compositions are: Morning Serenade, Evening Serenade, Corona Waltzes, and others for the piano; Ludeah for strings; sacred music, and composi- tions for full chorus choir. Mclellan collaborated with the librettists Cheever Goodwin, Frederick Rankin, and Clay M. Greene in the light operas The Regatta Girl, Cocheta, Princess Madcap, and others produced in several large cities of America.
During the latter years of the 19th century Portland had three instruc- tors in voice whose names are enshrined in musical history: Clara E. Mun- ger, who started Emma Eames on her operatic career; Mrs. J. H. Long, to whose teaching Geraldine Farrar acknowledges more than to any other source her success as an opera star; and William Henry Dennett, con- sidered for many years as the greatest vocal teacher in Maine. Mrs. Wil-
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liam Henry Dennett also achieved wide recognition as an instructor of voice.
The name Ira C. Stockbridge (1842-1937) is synonymous with the best in musical programs, and the Stockbridge Courses of Music, established in 1882, a series of annual recitals by prominent national and international ar- tists which ran locally for years, were the forerunners of the Maine Music Festivals. A native of Freeport, Stockbridge came to this city when very young and studied with Hermann Kotzschmar and George W. Marston. He was successively organist of the First Baptist, State Street, and Con- gress Square Churches, and conductor of various musical clubs. He was in- strumental in bringing to the city the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Walter Damrosch, Gilmore's Band, such artists as Melba, Nordica, Annie Louise Cary, Emma Eames, Anton Seidel, Sembrich, and Remenyi, the renowned violinist, and presented Paderewski in eight concerts. In his recently pub- lished reminiscences, Paderewski pays a glowing tribute to Portland audi- ences. "I had," he writes, "already played in all the important cities, but in many of the smaller places my first appearance, naturally, was not attended by large audiences. Suddenly there came a change. It happened in Port- land, Maine. Although it was my first appearance I saw to my amazement, the hall completely filled. There was actually a demonstration up to that moment unknown to me. Practically the entire audience rushed behind the platform to shake hands with me. It was a crowd of about one thousand people and everyone shook hands so cordially, that after that experience my right hand was swollen twice its size." Through the efforts of Stockbridge all of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas were produced here at different times, and for more than forty years his courses continued, bringing to the city the world's greatest artists.
The Maine Music Festival, known throughout the country as a major musical event, had its opening here October 18, 1897, under the direction of William Rogers Chapman (1855-1935), with Maine's own Madame Nor- dica as guest artist. The following day the Boston Daily Globe reported: "The opening of the Maine Music Festival ... was a success far exceeding the hopes of the management. Never before have the people of Portland had the opportunity of hearing the masterpieces of the world's greatest com- posers interpreted by artists of the highest rank, supported by a magnifi- cently trained chorus of one thousand voices and a superb orchestra of sixty pieces. That they fully appreciated the opportunity was attested by the im- mense audience which assembled in the auditorium ." It was the be-
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ginning of a renaissance in music in Maine. Mr. Chapman, as director, succeeded in bringing here the world's greatest artists-Schumann-Heink, Galli-Curci, Melba, Eames, Lillian Blauvelt, Jeritza, Gigli, Calvé, and others. In the fall of 1926 William Rogers Chapman terminated his ser- vices as conductor, and the organization disbanded.
During the 1938-39 season a series of Community Concerts was inau- gurated under the direction of Donald H. Payson, bringing to the city such artists as Lotte Lehmann, Lauritz Melchior, Marian Anderson, Bruna Castagna, and others. These courses have created a wide musical interest and have attained a growing popularity.
The Federal Music Project in Portland, consisting of a concert orchestra, band, chorus, and teaching unit have up to the early fall of 1939 presented under the supervision of Reginald Bonnin, State Director, 476 concerts in Portland and vicinity with a total attendance of 145,616. The project has also given 69 radio broadcasts. Teachers have given instruction to 287 children who might otherwise have been unable to receive such benefits.
Under the supervision of Frank J. Rigby and later Joseph L. Gaudreau, Portland's public schools have won musical distinction. The Lincoln Junior High School has a first band of 45 pieces and a second band of about forty pieces; the musicians being placed in either band according to their ability. The 82-piece band and the 65-piece orchestra of Deering High School have presented outstanding concerts. The band is the largest high school band in Maine and won the highest rating in Class A in the spring of 1939 at the Maine and at the New England Music Festivals. Deering High benefits musically in receiving Lincoln Junior students, who go to that higher school for their final years' work. Until 1926 the band of Portland High School was part of the Cadet Corps; today the school has a 45-piece orchestra and a 35-piece band.
The Portland Music Teachers' Association was formed for the advance- ment of musical education, the protection of the business interests of its members, and the cultivation of co-operation among them. Organized in 1929, it has a membership of 60 composed of professional teachers in various branches of music and has for several years sponsored a series of well-attended concerts.
The famous Kotzschmar Memorial organ, installed in Portland City Hall Auditorium, was presented to the city in 1912 by Cyrus Hermann Kotz- schmar Curtis, in memory of his father's old friend, Portland's well- known music director. The first municipal organist was Will C. Mac-
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farlane; others who have sat at the Kotzschmar console include Irving J. Morgan, Edwin H. Lemare, Charles R. Cronham, Alfred Brinkler, Fred Lincoln Hill, John Fay, and Howard W. Clark. Under the auspices of the American Guild of Organists a series of concerts is presented on this famous organ through the summer months, featuring the performances of na- tionally known as well as local organists. On July 1, 1912, an ordinance creating a municipal music commission was passed by the city council and approved by the mayor. The purpose of the commission was to take charge of the new organ and municipal music. The commission sponsored evening and afternoon concerts over a period of years, which were supported by local subscriptions, and augmented by small admission charges to the gen- eral public.
Portland had an infant musical prodigy in Willy Ferrero, son of a well- known musical couple. Born here in May, 1906, the child early showed an aptitude for musical instruction, and when two years of age was taken to Italy by his parents. At three years and eight months the boy-wonder di- rected several symphonic pieces at the Trocadero, in Paris. Massenet, the composer, who assisted at the time, kissed the prodigy at the conclusion of the concert and said: "Go, you are a born artist. Of you history will cer- tainly speak." When four, Ferrero led the orchestra in the Folies Ber- gères, in Paris, and two years later directed a symphonic concert at the Teatro Costanzi, in Rome. Before he had reached his tenth birthday, the young maestro had directed the Imperial Orchestra of 120 pieces at St. Petersburg on the invitation of Nicholas II, and for his direction of the Albert Hall Orchestra in London he was decorated by Queen Alexandria. Ferrero's triumphs continued until the World War, when he began a more serious study of music. In 1924 he was graduated from the Austrian State Academy of Advanced Composition at Vienna. He has since conducted or- chestras in Prague, Warsaw, Vienna, and Moscow, but has never returned to the country of his birth.
Corner of Fore and Chatham Streets
1730
OLD BAILEY HOESE
Old Bailey House
Tate House
Summer Night
Winter
Springtime
Surf Fishing
Birthplace of Henry W. Longfellow
611931
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November
JUNK STORE
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WHERE 254
SALT
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Old Fore Street Junk Shop
THEATER
There were neither theaters nor theatrical performances of any kind in Portland prior to the Revolution for the entire Province of Maine was under ruling of the austere Puritans of Massachusetts. They regarded the play- house as the direct road to perdition and they would countenance no such levity. Consequently the citizens of old Falmouth, gay and pleasure-loving in contrast to their somber rulers, were compelled to limit their amusement to junketing sleighing-parties in season, good eating, and occasional tip- plings at the 'Widow' Greele's on Hampshire Street or at Broad's in Stroudwater. Fashionable balls and dancing parties were the vogue but even those innocent pastimes were not always free from persecution for in 1766 Thomas Wait, Nathaniel Deering, and their wives were indicted for dancing.
Scattered and furtive stage performances had been given in parts of the Colonies as early as 1716. Some years later in direct defiance of the au- thorities a mixed troupe of amateurs and professionals staged a play in a Boston coffee house; it was so popular that it caused an incipient riot and thus gave the Puritans an opportunity of promptly enacting a law to rid New England of the house of the devil for all time. This law forbade stage plays and theatricals of any kind under severe penalties, on the ground that plays "have a pernicious influence on the minds of young people and greatly endanger their morals by giving them a taste for intrigue, amuse- ment and pleasure."
Popular opinion in Massachusetts and in the District of Maine ultimately rebelled against such harsh restrictions. In 1792 Portland's only news- paper, The Eastern Herald, defied tradition and showed an active editorial interest in the theater controversy that was being waged in the General Court of Massachusetts over the repeal of the drama law. The vigorous leader of the liberal movement was a man from Maine, John Gardiner, a representative to the General Court from Pownalboro Town; he pleaded for
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the "more polished refinement of social life and the opportunity to delight in the rational entertainment of a chaste and well-regulated Theatre." De- spite the hostile and uncompromising attitude of the authorities and stim- ulated by the growing liberal movement, traveling troupes of players from New York began presenting performances under the subterfuge of moral lectures in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and even in prim Vermont, but they did not venture into Maine.
The first theatrical performance to be given in Portland, or in Maine, was in October, 1794, when a company of English actors directed by Charles Stuart Powell presented The Lyar and a farce entitled Modern Antiques or the Merry Mourners. Between the plays, to which there was an admis- sion charge of three shillings, some of the talented members of the troupe entranced the first night audience with several renditions of the Learned Pig, the early counterpart of today's A Tisket-A Tasket. This was an his- toric occasion as it heralded a new chapter in the cultural movement al- ready developing in the small community. Completely recovered from the devastating effects of the British bombardment, the thriving Falmouth town could boast nearly 4,000 population and 500 homesteads. The elite and the financially able citizens were already contemplating sending their youth to the recently opened Bowdoin College or to the New Portland Academy, both of which were soon to be the school grounds of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
Although, for this first performance, the town did not have a theater, the play bills glowingly advertised the Assembly Hall as the "New Theatre." The Assembly Hall, to which the citizens repaired for important festive occasions, was the town's first public hall and community center; in it a "Mr. Armand of Boston" had opened the first dancing school, and the hall had been the scene of the first side show in which waxworks and a "know- ing dog" were exhibited. Later equipped with a crudely built stage and rough benches, and lighted by candles, it became known as the "temple of the drama."
Portland's opening theatrical performance was well attended, and The Eastern Herald met the occasion by creating a drama critic who columned that the play was "judiciously cast and supported to admiration. Mr. Powell in his role told some 'UNCONSCIONABLES' and with as good face as if he had been used to it. In a word we do not recollect ever having heard greater lies better told." The Powell company remained in Portland for several weeks presenting a variety of plays: Jane Shore, Incle and Yarico,
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and others popular in the late 18th century. Presented thrice weekly, the performances usually consisted of a five-act comedy or tragedy, followed by a farce, and with several songs and impromptu dances added for good measure. Altogether, the first theatrical venture proved an artistic and financial success.
With the departure of the Powell company Portland lost the thread of theatrical endeavor until 1796 when the local newspaper carried the an- nouncement: "Mrs. Tubbs late Mrs. Arnold, of the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, London, ... begs to inform the Ladies and Gentlemen of Portland and its vicinity, that she proposes having a Concert of Vocal and Instru- mental Music, at the Assembly Room. ... After which Mr. Tubbs intends setting up a Theatre, and performing some of the most admired plays and farces, having engaged a few able and eminent performers for that pur- pose .... Doubting not the patronage of the ladies and gentlemen of this town, he offers the above as a slight specimen of the amusement he will be able to afford them."
The concert, however, seems to have been a dismal failure; the Herald's early critic very blandly summed it up: "Mr. Tubbs plays the Piano-Forte well but he cannot sing and should not attempt it." Four days later the Tubbs troupe presented Bickerstaffs' The Padlock, a musical piece, and Garrick's Miss In Her Teens or a Medley of Lovers. This performance oc- casioned a veritable blast of censure.
Portland in those early days, although it was considered in the 'sticks' by traveling troupes, was quite familiar with standards of good perform- ance; many of its townfolk had, by this time, traveled to Boston, New York, and Philadelphia to view with growing interest the thriving theatri- cal movement of the period. Interesting is the criticism of the Tubbs' pre- sentation: "A correspondent who was present at the exhibition of Friday evening conceives it to be his duty to inform the Manager that the Ladies and Gentlemen of the town were disappointed in the performance. Both the play and the afterfarce were shamefully cut up and mangled and re- duced to nothing or what was worse than nothing. Of the play there was little left but its obscenity-of the players nothing perhaps ought to be said especially if it be true that they were so much hurried so as not to have an opportunity of a single rehearsal. It is hoped that the Gentlemen of the town will attend once more but the Ladies perhaps ought not to attend till it is known whether their ears are again to be offended with expressions of obscenity and profanity." Later when two Portland men joined the troupe,
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the critic was further displeased with their attempts at leading parts, for he severely criticised the manager of the troupe and described everyone in the audience as being "compelled to suppress indignation"; they "seemed to literally sweat for relief. The exhibition and the sweat last for an hour and a half."
One member of the Tubbs troupe, however, seems to have enraptured the critic, as well as the gentlemen if not the ladies of the town, by her "sweet innocence" and vivacious manner as she "tripped across the stage singing Listen to the Voice of Love." She was Elizabeth Arnold, 16-year-old daughter of the leading actress. One local poet and wit was so enamored of her beauty and voice that he composed an epilogue for her concluding performance in which he expressed the fond hope that she would soon re- turn to gladden their hearts. But favorite Elizabeth did not return; soon after she traveled with the troupe to South Carolina and eventually married David Poe of Baltimore, a fellow actor. The poet, Edgar Allen Poe, was their son.
The Powell company returned to Portland in 1799 with a greatly aug- mented cast. The dramatic critic waxed eloquent in his praise of their plays, as well as the players, and "rejoiced that Portland is again blessed with theatrical entertainments." Among the plays presented was Romeo and Juliet, the first Shakespearean play performed in Maine.
The practically virgin theatrical territory of Maine began to attract other traveling companies, but the growing popularity of playgoing soon created alarm and aroused opposition among the more sedate and the re- ligious. By way of conciliation the players took special care that no per- formances were given on nights devoted to worship, and as a further sop, donated the profits of one evening's performance to the poor of the town. A great variety of plays was offered in Portland during the 1800's, chiefly by the Powells. The old Assembly Hall, which seated less than a hundred persons, lost its moment of theatrical glory as performances were started in Mechanic's Hall on Fore Street and the old Union Hall on Free Street, the latter having been fitted up as a summer theater. Among the most popular and frequently repeated shows were: Jane Shore, Children of the Woods, All the World's a Stage, Lovers' Quarrel, Jew and Doctor, and The Stranger. A particularly favorite play was The Sultan or The Cap- tive, based on the Algerian pirates off the coast of Tripoli, where Portland's Commodore Edward Preble waged a successful war on piracy. In 1805 Macbeth was presented for the first time.
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Emboldened by their success the Powells proposed to erect a building de- voted entirely to the theater, and arrangements were made to carry the project into immediate effect. This was too much for the local clergy and meetings soon were held to protest the plan. This opposition, led by Deacon Woodbury Storer, not only defeated the theater project but was successful in having a law passed that prohibited under a heavy penalty the construc- tion of a building for theatrical exhibitions, and stopped persons from act- ing or assisting in the performance of any stage plays without a license that could be obtained from the Court of Sessions. This measure, combined with the town's commercial embarrassment resulting from the enforcement of the Embargo Act of 1807, effectually brought all theater productions in the town to a standstill; they were not again revived until after the separa- tion of the District of Maine from Massachusetts and its establishment as an independent State in 1820.
Portland was not, however, entirely without divertissement for the towns- folk could, if they so desired, take lessons on the "violin and guitar from Professor Nicholas Rudoerf of Boston," or could "repair to the Assembly Hall for some elegant Music." The curious could be entertained by the "Beautiful Lion on show at Mr. Motley's tavern every day except Sunday." The Portland Museum, a long building in Haymarket Row (Monument Square), was also a popular rendezvous; no stage shows were given, but there were exhibits of waxworks, stuffed animals, freaks, panoramas of strange lands, and bizarre and colorful paintings of battlefields and In- dian scenes. After some years of success the Museum was finally closed, and the effects were sold at public auction; a local story relates that Longfellow, the poet, bought a painting for $5, for which he was later offered $500.
Between 1820 and 1829 the old Union Hall became the principal theater of Portland. Feeling against stage shows still ran high. Some of the stern Puritan-minded citizens frequently made attempts to invoke the law of 1806 against play acting, but the attitude of the general public was more favorably disposed toward the theater and the players were able to evade the law. Chiefly with an eye toward business and to attract visitors to the city, a group of local citizens met in 1829 to discuss plans for a more spa- cious place of amusement. These plans soon crystallized in the construction of a "neat and convenient" theater at the head of Free Street, on the site of the present Chamber of Commerce building. Known as the Free Street Theatre, the first theater building cost, with its land, slightly more than $10,000, a "magnificent amount" for the time. Edwin Forrest and the
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elder Booth played engagements there, as did other prominent actors of the early years of the 19th century. After a "short blast of success," as its brief existence was termed, it languished for lack of patronage and the building was sold to the Second Baptist Society for a church. The society, according to a report of the time, "purged it as with fire," remodeled the building, added a spire, and called it the Free Street Church. However, in "purging" the building the society failed to remove all traces of its former theatrical connections; until shortly before the church was torn down to make way for a later building, there was in an obscure part of the structure, near one of the old entrances, a legend with an ominous black clenched hand, forefinger pointing downward, which read: "To The Pit." Church visitors, some of whom were familiar with the Calvinistic emphasis of the church's earlier days, were often considerably confused by the legend, until an explanation had been made.
In 1829 under the veil of a museum, another theater was built. This building, on Union Street, was fairly modern for it was equipped with a regular pit, dress circle, gallery and 'nigger heaven'; admission prices were from "$8 for boxes to 25c for colored people." This theater was the first real home of a stock company in the city; many famous theatrical stars played on its stage: Wyzeman Marshall, Mrs. Farren, Barry Sullivan, Sir William Don, Barney Williams, Mrs. Davenport, and Edwin Forrest. Such plays as Macbeth, Othello, Carpenter of Rouen, Richard III, and William Tell were presented. A local paper records the beauty of the scene when little Eva "was transported to Heaven in a tissue paper elevator" in the first performance in Portland of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Joe Proctor in the role of Jibbenainosy in the Nick of the Woods was long a favorite. The fore- runners of minstrelsy, Jim Crow and Long Tail Blue, gave eccentric dances and sang their popular song:
I am a Boston nigger I'd have you all to know That I came down to Portland To jump Jim Crow.
This second theater burned in 1854 and was never rebuilt. Until the late 1870's spasmodic efforts were made to maintain stock in Lancaster Hall and in the old Deering Hall; on the Deering stage such actors as Lawrence Bar- rett, E. L. Davenport, Lily Langtry, Dion Boucicoult, Thomas Keene, Jefferson Lee, and Charlotte Thompson were presented in a wide repertory of plays. Sothern, Marlowe, and Robert Mantel performed there in
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Shakespearean plays; there, too, John Wilkes Booth, who later assassinated Lincoln, impressed Portland theatergoers with his acting in Richelieu, Othello, Hamlet, and especially the Corsican Brothers in which he "wielded a stiletto with murderous effects." Booth, then a young man, was regarded locally as rather irresponsible; a newspaper editorial of that time, after Booth had neglected to pay his advertising bills, stated: "We do not propose to discuss his merits as an actor, but our experiences with him shows that he lacks the requisites of a gentleman."
About 1870 a decided public taste for opera caused the management of Deering Hall to change its name to Ward's Opera House; it featured Wally Ward and His Varieties as its opening program. The success of Ward's soon led to the conversion of old Fluent Hall, which formerly stood at the corner of Congress and Exchange streets, into the Portland Museum and Opera House, with a seating capacity of 800. Elaborate ceremonies attended its opening performance of The Bohemian Girl, and significant, perhaps, of the changing trend, was the blessing given the new show house by a local clergyman. The early programs of the museum were devoted to opera, but this proved none too popular in Portland, and so presentations were changed almost overnight to legitimate drama; the name 'Opera,' also, was dropped from all advertising. Lack of financial support and grow- ing competition of visiting companies from Boston forced the museum to close after a few years of operation. Later it was reopened as Fanny Marsh's Theatre, with a company directed by the popular actress of that name, but in 1880 its curtain was lowered for the last time.
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