Helen Lemmens-Sherrington

[2] In 1859 The Illustrated London News said of her: Madame Lemmens' voice is pure, brilliant and mellow: its compass exceeds two octaves and a half, with singular facility of vocalisation.

With much natural feeling and artistic expression, Madame Lemmens possesses a refined and graceful style, and is altogether one of the most accomplished singers of the day.

The singers engaged were Lemmens-Sherrington (Maid Marian), Mme Lemaire, Charles Santley, Mr Parkinson and John Sims Reeves (Locksley).

It was so successful that Reeves and Sherrington got a better box office even than Thérèse Tietjens and Antonio Giuglini on the alternate nights in Il trovatore and Don Giovanni.

[5] Immediately after this, with Santley, Janet Monach Patey and others, she appeared briefly in Wallace's The Amber Witch, but the bailiffs moved in, and on transfer to Drury Lane Theatre her role was taken by Euphrosyne Parepa-Rosa.

[6] In January to March 1864, at Her Majesty's, Lemmens-Sherrington sang Marguerite in Gounod's Faust, in the second year of the English production, in the cast with Santley (introducing Dio possente), Reeves (distinguished in Act 1) and Marchesi (Mephisto).

A description drawn from The Daily Telegraph shows that at a private hearing at The Crystal Palace on Good Friday 1878, "...both duets and solos were successfully tried by Madame Lemmens-Sherrington, M. Lemmens, Signor Foli, M. Manns and other skilled musicians, whose acute sense caused a phenomenon as yet unexplained—namely, that the musical sounds are reproduced in a higher key, half a tone being the difference.

George Bernard Shaw, who was present, observed, "Madame Sherrington's method was always of the safest; and she has the advantage, not common among artists, of being a clever and sensible woman."