Music: Turkel Over Pashas

The audience which gathered at the Royal Opera House in Cairo one night last week had the feeling that nothing which happened on the stage would be any more exciting than the sight of Prime Minister Ismail Sidky Pasha sitting in his box glowering at Former Prime Minister Mustafa Nahas Pasha, his bitterest political enemy, in a box just opposite. The opera was AÏda, a particularly old story for Cairo. Years ago, Khedive Ismail Pasha, swollen over the success of the new Suez Canal, had commissioned Verdi to write it for the opening of that same opera house. The tunes, familiar as the Nile settings, promised no great excitement.

Then the curtain went up and soon AÏda, the slave girl, started to sing. Immediately the audience forgot its hostile pashas, thought only of her. After the act she was cheered, and called back a dozen times. So excited was U. S. Minister William M. Jardine that he violated a sacred tradition of the opera house, went back stage to congratulate her. Minister Jardine knew something of her story. Though her immigrant parents had shaken their heads, Anna Turkel had left her home and the seven younger Turkels in Woonsocket. R. I., had gone to Manhattan with a nebulous notion of studying singing. To pay for her living she got a job as candy clerk in the Metropolitan Opera House. During the acts she would sneak downstairs to listen to Ponselle, Bori, Jeritza. Now, a group of Manhattanites* are financing her for three years abroad.

* Among them: Mrs. Frederick Brown, wife of the Manhattan realtor, Mrs. Ralph Jonas, wife of Director Jonas of Manufacturers’ Trust Co. of New York, Banker Jules Bache, Board Chairman Ludwig Vogelstein of American Metal Co., Banker Lewis Strauss of Manhattan.