AMBIT.
There is nothing fresh respecting our musical Theatres, except the an- nouncement put forth by Mr. E. T. Smith, the present Lessee of Drury Lane, and the new Lessee of her Majesty's Theatre, that he will open the latter house on the 10th April. Mr. Smith speaks with characteristic grandiloquence of the great things he is about to do in restoring this theatre to its pristine splendour, and we hope that he will act up to his professions. He mentions the names of only two of his future com- pany; our old acquaintance Alboni, and Borghi Mame, the present prima donna of the Paris Italian stage, together with several eminent dancers, from which it may be inferred that he means to give more at- tention than has been bestowed upon it of late, to the Terpsichorean branch of his entertainments.
Italian opera flourishes in Dublin at present. A company, of which Piccolomini, Rudersdorff, Belart, and Aldigieri are the principal mem- bers, is drawing large audiences to the Theatre Royal. Piccolomini has been going the round of her principal parts, and is wonderfully popular with the Dublin public. The little prima donna is not only applauded with Hibernian vehemence, but is followed to her hotel every night by crowds of students, who sometimes succeed in taking the horses from her carriage and dragging her home in triumph ; " very much (says a Dub- lin correspondent) after the fashion of the picture in which a heathen goddess is represented sitting in a chariot drawn by a flock of geese." Mademoiselle Piccolomini (who, it is said, was married the other day to an Italian nobleman) is a clever and attractive performer, but her powers as an artist do not entitle her to such extravagant homage. The musical entertainments of the week have been the Monday Popu- lar Concert, and the Concert of the Vocal Association on Thursday even- ing. Both were excellent, but without any new or remarkable feature. Last week, there was a Musical Festival at Durham, on a large scale, and attended with much success. The principal singers were persons of local reputation : among them was Mrs. Sunderland, who is not only the prima donna of the Northern Counties, but has contended on equal terms with our first singers at Exeter Hall. The band and chorus, which were large and powerful, were selected from the Bradford Festival Choral So- ciety. Judas Haecabens was performed on Tuesday evening ; The _Messiah on Wednesday. morning ; and the Festival concluded with a mis- cellaneous concert on Wednesday evening. The performances were at- tended by the principal nobility and gentry of the county, and by an im- mense concourse of people from the neighbouring towns and villages. It is only in that extensive district which has been called "the Germany of England," that a musical performance of such magnitude and excellence could be got up without any aid whatever from the metropolis. Gounod's new opera, Philemon et Baucis, produced last week at the Thatre Lyrique, has been very favourably received, and appears to de- serve its success. The well-known classical subject of the visit paid by Jupiter and Mercury (Vulcan in the libretto) to an aged couple whose hospitality is rewarded with the renewal of their youth and beauty, is cleverly treated by the dramatists, Messrs. Barbier and Cane ; and the music is an agreeable mixture of the comic and the romantic. The suc- cess of the piece is much owing to its excellent performance; Baucis being personated by Madame Miolan Carvalho, Philemon by Froment, Jupiter by M. Battaille, and Vulcan by M. Balanque. M. Sainton and his newly-wedded spouse, who are passing their honeymoon in Paris, gave a concert at the Hotel du Louvre on Thursday week, which was attended by a large concourse of the elite of Parisian musical society. Our fair and gifted countrywoman fully supported her reputation ; she excited the enthusiasm of the audience, and the journals are loud in her praise. We have great pain in saying, that Jullien, so long and in many respects so deservedly a favourite in England, has been seized with insanity in Paris. After an attempt to commit suicide by stabbing himoelf, he has been placed in a lunatic asylum.
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