The "Orpheus" Choir in the Operetta "Patience"

The "Orpheus Choir" will perform, in the West Hall of the American University of Beirut, at half past eight in the evening of the coming April 25, 27, and 28, the operetta "Patience," or "The Poet's Bride," and will devote one performance to school pupils on the afternoon of Sunday, April 29, at half past four.

The Orpheus Choir: Whoever follows the musical movement in Lebanon will surely notice the tremendous individual effort that Mr. Afif Bulos has never ceased to carry on for three years, since his return from England. He came back to Lebanon after specializing in English literature, music, and singing, to gather about him the scattered amateurs and those of artistic gifts and to form from them the "Orpheus Choir" — the young company whose name is now on every tongue, thanks to the brilliant success it has unfailingly won; we mention in particular the operetta "The Mikado," staged last year in West Hall, which left the loveliest echo in cultivated circles and won the sympathy and encouragement of President Chamoun and the First Lady of Lebanon...

Mrs. Chamoun: Since that time Mrs. Chamoun has gladly consented to place all the choir's performances under her patronage, out of faith in its important artistic influence, in its distinguished diligence in producing polished concerts of song, and in its founding of a good nucleus for fine classical singing in our country and from among our own children... And if the Orpheus Choir had no merit but this, it would suffice. Nor has the activity of the Orpheus Choir been confined so far to the operetta 'The Mikado'; it has gone beyond it to the concerts of song and sacred music witnessed by the UNESCO hall, West Hall, Irwin Hall at Beirut College for Women, and the hall of the Brummana school. A quarter of the proceeds of the performances is set aside to meet part of the expenses, and what the choir has given to charitable institutions has reached 3,500 Lebanese lira.

The members of the Orpheus Choir: The choir numbers fifty young women and men belonging to seven countries — the greater part Lebanese, then Palestinians and Americans, and among them the Englishman, the Italian, the Greek, and the Iranian... all of them of their leader's persuasion in laboring at the practice of song in pursuit of perfection.

The story of the operetta Patience: — or "The Poet's Bride" — and "Patience" is the name of the heroine; the part will be taken by Miss Salwa Hannoush of the angelic voice. The events of the story unfold with twenty merry maidens betrothed to twenty officers; matters stand in a half-settled state until there appears upon the stage a young poet, and the twenty maidens promptly fall, one and all, into the snares of his love and forsake their betrothed — which kindles the fire of jealousy in the hearts of the twenty officers, and here are stirring and delightful scenes... The twenty beauties fling themselves at the poet, who of them all inclines to Patience alone — the simple village girl... What, then, is the fate of the rest? Does the poet marry his beloved, the heroine, in the end? And do the remaining girls go back to their betrothed, or is there some new surprise, and the appearance of a second poet??

That is what we shall see in the Orpheus Choir's operetta "Patience," at the American University of Beirut (West Hall), on April 25, 27, and 28 of this month. Until then!!!...