Show ASCENDING PRICES FOR SINGEJIS The gradual rise in the payments made to singers has more than kept pace with the prices paid to composers compos-ers A look through the treasurers accounts of the old Sacred Harmonic society would confirm this statement in a very certain and interesting way For example at the Christmas performance per-formance of The Messiah in December De-cember 1853 Miss Birch was paid 8 guineas Mme SaintonDolby S guineas guin-eas Mr and Mrs Lockey together 16 guineas and Mr Weiss the composer of The Village Blacksmith 6 guineas guin-eas At the performance of Israel in Egypt in the same year Mr Sims Reeves took 15 guineas Carl Formes 10 guineas and Mme SaintonDolby S guineas Nine years afterward in December 1862 for singing The Messiah Mes-siah Mme Rudersdorff was paid 10 guineas Mr Henry Haigh 8 guineas while Mme SaintonDolbys terms had risen to 10 guineas I need hardly be said that concert vocalists now in full demand would laugh at such fees Some years ago when Mr Toole was returning thanks to an audience in the Theatre Royal Edinburgh he referred to the circumstance circum-stance that he and Sims Reeves and Henry Irving had all at an early stage J V i II of their careers sought professional honors in the Scottish capital The I salaries of the three friends according accord-ing to Mr Toole were then The singer 30s the comedian 40s the I tragedian SOs each per week Of course added Mr Toole we get more now Chambers Journal I |