Risley’s Combinaion Troupe

Additional non-musical performers listed.

“Prof. Risley takes his company, which has lately been delighting the audiences of the Tammony [sic], to the New-York Theater this week.” Goes on, but no mention of music.

“Professor Risley’s great European Variety Troupe will appear to-night at the New York Circus or Hippotheatron [these are two names for the same venue] opposite the Academy of Music…a host of singers and dancers are announced to appear.”

Brief.

Amongst list of performers: “…Mr. Sidney Franks, the ballad-singer, who freshens our remembrance of comic and quaint Sam Cowell; Mr. W. H. Henderson and Mr. W. Hamilton, both musicians of talent and repute…and the burlesque performers and singers, Miss Clara Vernon, Miss Emma Alford, and the sisters Lelia and Florence. This is a goodly array of names, and the names represent a well-chosen and well-trained collection of artists. The entertainment given by them, under Professor Risley’s management, is many-sided and addresses various orders of taste—its elements being burlesque, farce, operetta, ventriloquism, gymnastic feats, ballet-dancing, and spectacle.”

“Professor Risley, having scoured Europe for theatrical novelties, and desolated the gay province of Andalusia by bereaving it of all its best dancers, came with his accumulated treasures to this country and began an engagement at the Tammany. After a week or two of effort there troubles ensued, and Risley emerged from the smoke of that fascinating resort, and with his troupe crossed the street and took possession of the Circus building, resorting to it its ancient title of the Hippotheatron—a word which in its very construction implies the presence of the horse, an animal utterly unknown in the Risley combination.

"In the circus arena he has built a stage occupying about one-third of the ring, and thereon disport his ballet troupe, his juggler, his performing monkeys, and his ballad singers. A small orchestra is provided with chairs in front of the stage; but as the members emerge from the recesses usually haunted by clowns and acrobats, it is with a feeling of disappointment that the audience observes that they do not come out turning summersaults or indulging in flying leaps. An action, like this, which, in view of the locality, would be peculiarly consistent, could not fall to enhance the pleasure of the spectators. A double summersault by the man with the bass-viol, followed by a flying leap by the trombone, would certainly create a sensation.

“The Risley entertainment, on the whole, is fairly amusing, but it is presented in a style rather too provincial for metropolitan audiences. With improvements, it might take the place of the circus in popular regard as well as in mere locality.”

No mention of music.

“The Risley Combination, which has been playing during the past two weeks at Tammany, severed its connection with that place on the 16th, and will open at the Hippotheatron, Fourteenth street, this evening, 18th, inst. [Some history about the troupe.] …Sidney Franks, the comic singer, who, despite the unmanly opposition he has met with in certain quarters, worked his way into favor the past week, and received well merited encores, will here have a better chance to show his talents than was afforded him at the other house. And in addition to these there are the Spanish dancers, the male and female vocalists, the performing dogs and monkeys, etc.”

No mention of music.