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In Manhattan she will sing Tosca, hitherto regarded as the sacred property of Soprano Maria Jeritza, also tall, blonde, athletic, but no spitter.
*Supervia's Orpheus is probably the bulkiest, most troublesome talisman on record. But nearly all musicians are superstitious, carry some sort of charm. Arturo Toscanini keeps sewed in his dress clothes' pocket a picture of his three children taken when they were little and a visiting card on which Composer Giueseppe Verdi sent him New Year's greetings shortly before he died. Caruso used to have every costume made with two little pockets on either side. In them he kept vials of salt water and if he felt thirsty he turned his back on the audience, took a drink. Soprano Rosa Ponselle never sings without the little silver cross she wore when she made her Metropolitan Opera debut. Pianist Ernest Schelling keeps in his waistcoat pocket a four-leaf clover pressed between glass. Pianist Vladimir Horowitz always has a picture of Liszt in the artists' room, Violinist Yehndi Menuhin a bronze head of Toscanini. Pianist José Iturbl goes to every concert with an apple and a clean collar. During intermission he eats the apple and changes his collar. Baritone Lawrence Tibbett wears a comical silver rabbit when he sings, Tenor Gigli a little gold bell his daughter once pinned on his pajamas. Violinist Jascha Heifetz hates to admit that he is superstitious about his ring with the Ceylon ruby but Soprano Lucrezia Bori is not one bit ashamed of the little gold key she wears pinned to her garter. She calls it her "key to happiness."
*Last week President Samuel Insull warned the Civic's guarantors, whose five-year pledge ends with this season, that unless they renew pledges for $500,000 there may be no opera next year.