"White Bird"

The "Opera In Our Language Foundation, Inc." held high revel at the Studebaker Theatre, Chicago. A gold medal, the "David Bispham Memorial Award," was presented to Mr. Ernest Trow Carter, the composer of an American opera* The White Bird. The libretto was written by Mr. Brian Hooker, a veteran in the art of angling for prizes./-

The story of The White Bird aroused recollections of a notorious divorce case--which perhaps added to its

"Americanism." It was concerned with a hunting party, consisting of a jealous husband, his wife, a handsome guide, As for the end--the guide aims his gun at the lady's white scarf, thinking it to be a distant bird--with necessarily fatal result.

The performance of this autochthonous work was good. The drama, for all its enticing possibilities, is undramatic. The music was just what one has come to expect of "prize music." Agreeable and harmless: here a pretty duet, there a lilting quartet, yonder a graceful waltz. And that was all.

* "A very American opera," Gilbert and Sullivan would have called it.

/- Mr. Hooker is the man who collaborated with the late Dr. Horatio Parker in the making of Mona and Fairyland, each of which brought $1,000 awards--and failed on the stage.