with Tietjens and Nilsson, Mme Sinico, Gardoni and Rokitanski. The newspaper critic Herman Klein heard her in rehearsal at the 1868 Norwich Festival. He later remarked that then her voice was still fresh, powerful and penetrating, with the curiously dramatic 'human' quality that was perhaps its most notable attribute. Her style was marked by the same rare individuality, and her phrasing a curious blend of vigour and grace. She used portamento in approaching a high note from below, a technique often thought ugly, but in her a natural and artistic effect, for she was quite capable of entering a note with superb attack if she wished. Her magnificent energy and purity of tone was especially evident in the opening bars of the 'Inflammatus' in Rossini's Stabat Mater, and in 'Let the bright Seraphim'. Later career Tietjens sang again for the Royal Philharmonic Society in 1868. In the following year, when there was an attempt to form a union of the Her Majesty's and Covent Garden companies, the Italian season opened with Norma, Tietjens in the title role, with Sinico, Mongini and Foli. She also sang with Reeves and Santley in the premiere of Arthur Sullivan's The Prodigal Son in 1869. In 1870 Gassier retired (he died in 1872). The English première of Rossini's Messe Solennelle occurred with Tietjens, Sofia Scalchi, Mongini and Santley: and in 1871, Mme Tietjens was awarded the Gold Medal of the Philharmonic Society. In this first year of the award ten medals were given, and thereafter seldom more than one in any one year. When the Gye and Mapleson companies were successfully merged, in 1871, Tietjens was the one principal artist not re-engaged by George Wood. However, Lucrezia had remained a staple of her repertoire throughout the 1860s, and in May 1872 she again led a cast, on this occasion at Drury Lane, for the London debut of the tenor Italo Campanini (as Gennaro), with Trebelli as Orsino and the French baritone Jean-Baptiste Faure as Alfonso, under the baton of Sir Michael Costa. She also took the solos in Sullivan's Festival Te Deum at The Crystal Palace. Campanini was at once (but rather prematurely) acclaimed as the successor of Mario and Giuglini. But in the next years, it was with Campanini as Lohengrin, for Mapleson at Her Majesty's, that Tietjens attempted her only Wagnerian role, Ortrud; and in June 1874, in company with Christine Nilsson and