Music: New Voice

“At last opera has found a new golden voice,”‘ reads the Billboard ad for a new RCA Victor Red Seal record this week. The eminent critical authority behind the statement was Wagnerian Soprano Helen Traubel, but serious opera fans would do well to read the small type on the label. Traubel’s plug was for her new duet partner, Jimmy Durante, a man whose voice has all the golden quality of metallurgical coke.

The idea of a record was a natural after two Traubel appearances with Durante on television (TIME, Dec. n), in which she used her full Wagnerian range on the Durante specials, A Real Piano Player and The Song’s Gotta Come from the Heart. The new record, now on its way to distributors, consists of the same songs done as duets. It is on Victor’s classical label because Traubel’s exclusive Red Seal contract prevents her from recording for any less elevated series. Says Traubel: “It’s a pleasure to record with a great artiste whose voice sounds the same with bad needles.”