Barrier Miner (Broken Hill, NSW : 1888 - 1954), Tuesday 4 October 1938, page 4


Miss B. James' Charming Personality

T AM sure that-many oí those

who heard and saw Barbara 'James at the Tivoli Theatre:dur-

ing the. week ena would have liked to make the acquaintance of the girl behind that, charming personality and had an oppor-

tunity to chat with her

This is her second visit to Broken Hill for she sang here some years ago with Humphrey Bishop. In those days to visit Broken Hill one had to go through a baptism of dust, and Miss James could hardly believe sha was making the same journey as the clean, cool Comet bore her along.

Some time ago she terminated her en-gagement with the Trocadero in order to gratify a long-cnerished wish-to own a flower" shop. She attributes this taste to her grandfather, who was an ardent gardener, but she her-self in her active career has never been able to devote much time to real

gardening. Her shop is situated ut 1'ott's Point, but now that it is firmlyestablished she intends to devote more time to singing.

Tall, graceful and a true brunette, Miss James possesses thc most de-lightful speaking voice, completely different from either her soprano or contralto singing voices. When talk-ing she uses a restful, mellow mezzo tone. Milk is her prescription for keeping the voice in .trim with raw eggs (if one can take them) also re-commended. Disarmingly modest about her talents. Miss James makes light of her part in the New Era film "Show Business," the preview of which she attended in Melbourne re-cently. However, we shall all be looking forward to seeing^ her in the Cabaret scene when the picture is re-leased here. Sydney will be seeing it in about a month.

LIKES FILM WORK

Barbara has taken a liking to film work and remarks that one has to think so much about "camera angles " lighting, etc., that one has little time to remember the lack of an audience -a lack that has often proved an ob-

stacle to those fresh from the stage. Although she has never studied under outside music teachers, Miss James is by, no means .untaught. As she ex-presses it, "Having a first-class teacher in my father at home, I had no need to go elsewhere for music lessons."

Miss James does not yearn to again conduct a dance band. Having had the experience she knows how few aro the joys of a conductor! The work she prefers is singing with dance bands. Although her dual voice range is ra»« ana useful, her soprani singing is so sweet that she might do well to concentrate on that section.

A possession of which she is very proud is "Slinky," her blue roan spaniel, but there was an-other, a pug, who was a pal for 14 years, and I suspected a little catch in her voice as she' men-tioned that, it was killed by a car.

Whenever she can sparc the time, Miss James takes up sport, and she is the treasurer of thc MusiciansGolf Club in Sydney. She also plays tennis, rides, rows and swims. Par-ticularly fond of reading, she con-fesses that the "Readers' Digest'' is popular with her as she has so little time to. read full-length books.

Barbara is keen to travel abroad, and she has made the correct pre-paration-she has seen Australin first, having visited every State of the Commonwealth. Geraldton, in

¡Western Australia, is her favorite

Ispot because it has thc bluest water

she has ever seen and o"e can walk for miles along the shallows. Inci-dentally both her Durents played here at the Crystal Theatre many yeurs

ago.