At the present Metropolitan Opera House, Manhattan, approximately one-third of the audience can see the stage none too well. Last week in Musical America an article by Editor Deems Taylor describing Joseph Urban’s design for the new Metropolitan Opera House to be situated on West 57th St., Manhattan, promised that each and every operagoer could see the stage.
Unlike the old House, modeled on the European style where first consideration was good seats for the King and his retinue, the new structure plans to cut down the number of boxes from 54 to 35, to increase total seating capacity from 3,600 to 5,372. In oldfashioned opera houses seeing the stage was of minor importance. Since Richard Wagner introduced epic and dramatic beauties, the importance of the stage has increased. Mr. Urban’s plans not only provide superior sight lines for the audience; they also include a stage mechanism of elevators, steel screens, side rostrums, of such modern ingenuity that Max Reinhardt, most inventive of stage directors, exclaimed he could present any of his revolutionary dramatic spectacles on it.
The proposed opera house need not be supported by royalty, nor by directors. Part of the building is a 26-story apartment house. The rent will help to defray maintenance.
These plans, however, are not final. Mr. Urban has been variously designated “architect,” “associate architect,” “assistant architect.” His name and work are coupled with Architect Benjamin Wistar Morris. Mr. Morris’ plans are likely to differ from Mr. Urban’s, since they were drawn up separately, are based on a different school of architecture, are said to preserve the old traditions of opera houses, including the old number of boxes in the horseshoe.
Gabrilowitsch Protests
To help celebrate the centenary of Franz Schubert’s death, the Columbia Phonograph Co. has offered prizes* to the composers who submit the best fragments completing Schubert’s famed “Unfinished Symphony”. Of such efforts Ossip Gabrilowitsch, conductor of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, disapproves. Last week he wrote to the Committee in charge: “Several weeks ago the. . . Committee invited me to become a member of the Artists’ Advisory Board. Believing the purpose was a dignified tribute to the memory of the great composer, I gladly accepted. … I am now informed of… the competition for completing Schubert’s masterpiece. . . . This seems, to me, like adding a pair of arms to the Venus of Milo. … I request that my name be eliminated.”
*The prizes: to the International winner, $10,000; to each of ten zone winners, $750; to each of ten zone second prize winners, $250. For further information address New York University, Department of Music, Washington Square East, New York City.
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