Women of distinction/Chapter 25
CHAPTER XXV.
THE HYERS SISTERS.
It was probably April 22, 1867, when the Metropolitan Theatre of Sacramento, California, was filled with an anxious crowd of eight hundred or more human beings to witness the public beginning of two young Afro-American singers whose joint reputation since that time has stood without possibly a parallel in American history. These two young sisters, so often called the "Hyers Sisters," Anna Madah and Emma Louise Hyers,
THE HYERS SISTERS.
exhibited an aptness to imitate operatic performers when quite young. This peculiar and yet very natural quality led their parents to give them a chance. Opportunity at home was afforded with which the girls made such remarkable progress that professional teachers were soon a necessity.
Mr. James M. Trotter makes the following statement concerning them and their teachers:
After one year's instruction it was found that the girls had advanced so rapidly as to have quite "caught up" with their teachers (their parents), and it was therefore found necessary to place them under the instruction of others more advanced in music. Professor Hugo Sank, a German of fine musical ability, became then their next tutor, giving them lessons in vocalization and on the piano-forte. With this gentleman they made much progress. Another change, however, being decided upon, our apt and ambitious pupils were next placed under the direction of Madame Josephine D'Ormy, a lady of fine talents, an operatic celebrity, and distinguished as a skillful teacher. From this lady the sisters received thorough instruction in the Italian language, and were taught some of the rudiments of the German language. It is, in fact, to the rare accomplishments and painstaking efforts of Madame D'Ormy that the Misses Hyers owe mostly their success of to-day. For she it was who taught them that purity of enunciation and sweetness of intonation that are now so noticeable in their singing of Italian and other music; while under her guidance, also, they acquired that graceful, winning stage appearance for which they have so often been praised. Although, as was natural, quite proud of the rich natural gifts possessed by their children, and extremely delighted with the large degree of their acquirements in the art of music, their sensible parents were in no haste to rush them before the public, and it was therefore nearly two years after leaving the immediate tutelage of Madame D'Ormy when these young ladies made their debut. They also went to San Francisco and other places in California, where they gained great renown. After these concerts they retired to severe study preparatory to making a tour of the States. Finally deciding to proceed Bast, they sang to highly appreciative and enthusiastic audiences in several Western towns and cities. At Salt Lake City they were received with the very highest marks of favor. On the 12th of August, 1871, they gave a grand concert in Salt Lake Theatre, offering some five operatic selections.
The Daily Herald, of St. Joseph, Mo., had the following to say concerning them:
Whoever of our readers failed to visit the Academy of Music last evening missed a rare musical treat. The concert of the Hyers Sisters was absolutely the best; furnished those in attendance with the choicest music which has been in St. Joseph since we have resided here.
The Hyers Sisters are two colored ladies, or girls, aged respectively sixteen and seventeen years, but their singing is as mature and perfect as any we have ever listened to. We have read the most favorable reports of these sisters in the California papers, but confess that we were not prepared for such an exhibition of vocal powers as they gave us last night.
Miss Anna Hyers, the eldest, is a musical phenomenon. When we tell musicians that she sings E flat above the staff as loud and as clear as an organ they will understand us when we say she is a prodigy. Jenny Lind was the recipient of world-wide fame and the most lavishly bestowed encomiums from the most musical critics in Vienna twenty 5-ears ago. Parepa Rosa, it is claimed, reached that vocal altitude last summer. But the sopranos who did it flit across the planet like angels. Several competent musicians listened to Anna Hyers last evening and unanimously pronounced her perfectly wonderful. With the greatest ease in the world, as naturally and gracefully as she breathes, she runs the scale from the low notes in the middle register to the highest notes ever reached by mortal singers. Her trills are as sweet and bird-like as those with which the "Swedish Nightingale" once entranced the world.
After a real triumph in New York City and Brooklyn the Brooklyn Daily Union had the following to say:
Not only was every inch of standing room in the Young Men's Christian Association Hall occupied, but the ante-room and the stairway were completely jammed. In spite, however, of the uncomfortable crowding every one was pleased to be present and all were delighted with the concert. The young ladies are gifted with remarkable voices and sing together with perfect harmony displaying the full compass and beauty of their voices, which are sweet and clear.
A Boston paper said of them:
We were invited, with some fifty other persons, this forenoon to hear the singing of two colored young ladies, named Anna and Emma Hyers, of San Francisco, at the Meionaon. They are aged respective!y sixteen and fourteen years, and, after a casual inspection, may be called musical prodigies. They are, without doubt, destined to occupy a high position in the musical world.
Mr. Trotter said:
In Boston they made many personal friends, receiving from many of its most cultured people very flattering attentions; and here too were pointed out to them, in a candid and friendly spirit, such defects in their voices or manner of singing as only those skilled in the highest technique of the musical art could detect. All such suggestions were readily received by the young ladies, who, acting upon the same, made much advancement in the technical requirements of the lyrical art. They lingered in Boston, being loath to leave its congenial art circles, and to leave behind its many facilities for improvement in their profession. Finally deciding to start again on their travels, they visited many of the towns and cities of Rhode Island and Connecticut. Their singing everywhere gave the utmost satisfaction, and cultivated New England confirmed, in words of highest praise, the verdict of the West and New York.