There is Nothing like a Dame A novel by Bronwen Welsh Copyright© 2017 & 2018 Bronwen Welsh A sequel to 'The Might-Have-Been Girl' and 'All the World's a Stage'

Chapter 27   Madame Mussorgsky and an audition.

Madame Mussorgsky was very much as I had imagined her. She appeared to be in her sixties, a little below average height and a little greater than average in girth and she was dressed from head to toe in black. A silk blouse was teamed with a velvet skirt, stockings and 'sensible shoes'. Only a dark blue and white cameo brooch, attached to the blouse and presumably representing her late husband, relieved what used to be called 'widow's weeds'.

“Please come this way,” she said, leading me into the room across the corridor from where I had been waiting. It was a large airy room with an upright piano and a couple of music stands.

“Now, Miss Stow, you said you perform with the Imperial Shakespeare Company. I thought your name sounded slightly familiar and checking my collection of programmes I realised that I had seen you perform as 'Ophelia' in a production of 'Hamlet' some time ago. In that performance, you were required to sing, but it was only a very small part of the rôle. Is there anything else you would like to do involving singing?”

I decided to be straight with her and proceeded to explain Reggie's insistence that with my voice I could be taking part in musical theatre or light opera.

“Of course his opinion is totally unbiased,” I said with a smile. “I finally decided that the best thing I could do was approach an expert who would give me a real unbiased assessment, and so, here I am.”

Madame Mussorgsky smiled. “Well, perhaps I am more of an expert than your husband who naturally believes the best of you. I should explain my background, and you can decide for yourself whether I meet the criteria of 'expert'. I was born in Moscow and took singing lessons myself as a young girl. My first professional appointment was as part of the chorus at the Bolshoi Theatre. From there I graduated to small rôles in operas, and finally as understudy to some of the most famous names in Russian opera, but I doubt if you would have heard of any of them.”

I was intrigued. “Did you manage to do any performances?” I asked.

“Alas, the women were very robust in those days and rarely were too sick to perform. However, I did perform as 'Kseniya' in four performances of 'Boris Gudonov', which you may know was composed by Modest Mussorgsky, a distant relative of mine.” She said this with some pride. “Even then, the singer I replaced, who had a bad throat infection and had almost lost her voice, still wanted to perform and had to be almost physically restrained by the management.” She smiled at the memory.

“That would have been an amazing experience, performing in front of so many people in one of the world's greatest opera houses,” I said.

There was a faraway look in her eyes as though she was reliving the pinnacle of her career all those years ago. “Indeed it was,” she said. “But you would know all about that.”

It occurred to me that since she was almost certainly widowed, she had returned to her maiden name after her husband died, but I thought it might not be polite to enquire about that.

“Enough of reminiscing,” she said. “We have work to do. I would like to start with an assessment of your lung function and also your vocal range if you have no objection?”

“None at all,” I replied.

“Good, I would like to take a measurement with this machine called a spirometer;” she said, leading me across the room to a machine sitting on a small table. “It measures your lung capacity and also the speed with which you can exhale air. I will put a clip on your nose so that all the air is expelled through your mouth.

She went on to explain how I should take as deep a breath as possible, and then putting my lips to the mouthpiece, exhale as hard and as long as possible. After I did this, she showed me a graph which the machine had drawn on paper. This meant nothing to me of course, but Madame Mussorgsky said that for my age and sex, these were excellent results.

“Not that I expected anything else from a professional actress who is used to projecting her voice to the most distant seats in the theatre,” she said.

Then she sat at the piano and said that she would now like to check on my vocal range. This she did by getting me to sing 'Ah' along with her playing a series of scales, at the end of which she said: “Excellent. Well, you, my dear, are a mezzo-soprano, but you are able to go some way into the contralto range and with teaching and exercises, you will find that you can extend your range to three octaves.There are plenty of good parts in musicals that you could perform. What is your favourite musical?”

“It would have to be 'South Pacific',” I replied. “I often sing along with my CD, and I've watched the movie countless times.”

“I think you could sing 'Bali Ha'i' quite well, if fact, why don't we try it now?” she said.

I was surprised as I thought I'd start by singing scales, but she was the teacher so I agreed to her request. She apparently didn't need the music as she gave me the note to start on for the introduction: “Most people live on a lonely island...” and then carried on the accompaniment.

Just as I so often do when acting a part, I quickly lost myself in the song and its emotional story. I had half expected Madame Mussorgsky to stop me half-way through, but instead, she let me go right to the end where the final 'Bali Ha'i' trails off into silence. It took me a few seconds to return from the South Pacific to a room in Stratford and realise that she was watching me. Then she smiled.

“Not bad for an untrained singer, not bad at all. I'll let you into a secret; I've heard countless people sing that song and only three times have I let them go through to the end, the first time they sang it for me. One of those singers now stars on the London and Broadway stages.” Here she mentioned a very well known singer. “The other? Well, despite my urging, she preferred to stay as a housewife and amateur singer where she has been much in demand by regional non-professional companies. Now, there's you. I'm sorry to tell you Miss Stow, but you were wrong and your husband is right; you have the potential to be a really good professional singer. You need some tuition of course and plenty of practice, but it would not surprise me to see you on the stage in London's West End or even Broadway if you work hard enough.”

To be honest, I was rather shocked. Even though I enjoyed singing, I was fully prepared for her to tell me that I might make a good amateur singer but not a professional one. I tried to make light of it.

“So I might make a Juanita Hall one day,” I said, referring to the actress who played 'Bloody Mary' in the film of 'South Pacific'.

“I'll let you into a secret. Although Juanita Hall played the part on Broadway for many years, at the time the film was made her voice had deepened, and the singing voice of African-American Muriel Smith was used instead, although she wasn't credited.”

I was not totally surprised: “I've heard of that happening quite a bit, for example, Marni Nixon who sang for Deborah Kerr in 'The King and I', for Audrey Hepburn in 'My Fair Lady' and in many other films, but I never heard of Muriel Smith before,” I said.

“Well you have indeed heard her, on your CD of 'South Pacific',” laughed Madame Mussorgsky.

It had been a most enjoyable afternoon, and I was determined to have further lessons with Madame Mussorgsky. To finish off, she instructed me on practising some scales and told me to continue singing along with the radio or my CD collection, but to play the music quietly so that I could hear my own voice.

“You mentioned an audition tomorrow. May I ask what character and play it is?” she said.

“It's Lady M in 'The Scottish Play',” I replied.

There was a puzzled look on her face. “'Lady M'? 'Scottish Play'? Is that Shakespeare?” she said.

I laughed. “It's an old theatrical superstition not to mention the real name of the play unless you're in a production because it's supposed to bring bad luck,” I said. She still looked puzzled, so I broke my own rule and said: “It's 'Macbeth'.”

She smiled. “I see. Well, I hope I have taught you something today and you have taught me something too.”

Before I left, I told Madame Mussorgsky that depending on the outcome of the audition I would know what free time I had and that I would ring her to arrange another lesson soon.

A keen wind had risen since I entered the house, and as I left it whipped up my skirts and I shivered. It felt like an omen, but I told myself not to be so silly.

The following day I arrived early at the theatre for the audition. I had heard that besides myself and Edith, there were three other actresses who had made the shortlist for the part of Lady M. I would have backed myself to win the part if Edith was not also auditioning, but now I thought it was a case of 'touch and go'.

Soon we were all assembled in the auditorium and were in turn introduced to the director, Ioan Thomas. He greeted us in that lovely musical tone of a Welshman. He was part of the selection panel for the cast, along with the Artistic Director Gwynneth Soames, and her new assistant Harry Evans.

'Good heavens, all these Welsh names,' I thought. I was tempted to greet them with 'Bore da' but thought the joke might fall flat.

We drew numbers out of a hat to determine the order of the auditions so that there was no suggestion of favouritism. I was first and Edith was last. I didn't know if being first gave me an advantage or not, but I drew a deep breath and walked up the steps to the stage.

We had been asked to prepare the speech:

'The raven himself is hoarse
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan
Under my battlements. Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
Of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood.
Stop up the access and passage to remorse,
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
The effect and it! Come to my woman’s breasts,
And take my milk for gall, you murd'ring ministers,
Wherever in your sightless substances
You wait on nature’s mischief. Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark
To cry “Hold, hold!”'

This is a very dramatic speech and I thought we had been asked to perform it to see how quickly we could get into the character of Lady M. It contains that notorious phrase 'unsex me here' which has caused countless generations of schoolchildren to giggle and it was important to give it no more and no less emphasis than the rest of the soliloquy.

When I finished, I looked at the panel trying to gauge their reaction from their expressions, but they were doing a good job of keeping 'poker faces'.

“Thank you Harriet,” said Ioan. “May we have your own two selections please?”

“Yes, Mr Thomas. My first is Portia's 'The quality of mercy is not strained' and then Queen Gertrude's speech on the death of Ophelia - 'There is a willow grows aslant a brook'.”

These were two of my favourite speeches and contrast nicely with the drama of the first speech. To my surprise, when I had finished, the four other women applauded me. I bowed to them and the selection panel and left the stage, making my way back to the others in the stalls. The second young woman stood up and walked down to the stage, and Edith leaned over and murmured, “She just whispered to her friend 'We might as well go home'.”

I don't wish to sound boastful, but I felt that the other young women were no threat to me, all except Edith that is. Those of us left dutifully clapped each person of course, but I was waiting to hear my real rival for the part.

Edith was last to audition and was quite frankly excellent. When we had all finished, Ioan stood up to face us and thanked us all for attending the audition. He concluded with the traditional “We'll let you know.”

Edith had to prepare for the afternoon's performance of Othello. I asked the other young women if they would like to have a cup of coffee and they agreed so I led them to the café. They seemed a bit in awe of me, I'm not sure why.

“Realistically it's between you and Edith,” said one of the auditioners, I think her name was Jenny.

“I've learned never to second-guess an auditioning panel,” I replied while thinking to myself that she was probably right. “There are some other parts in the play. Would you take one if it was offered?”

“Oh yes!” they all replied. “Just being able to say we performed at Stratford is a great thing to put on a CV,” said one of them, and she was right of course.

I thought it was ironic that for Edith and I it was all or nothing. They certainly wouldn't offer us a minor part and perhaps we would have been insulted if they had. I went back to the flat to await the verdict and busied myself by catching up on some housework, but I found myself staring at the phone all the time, willing it to ring. I really needed to know, one way or the other. Finally, it rang and I picked it up to answer.

To be continued.

Many thanks once again to Louise Ann and Julia Phillips for spotting my 'typos', thus allowing me to correct them before publishing.