SNIPPET: Ireland has produced many fine tenors over the years and Belfast's James JOHNSTON is one of them. For your information - a several-page piece by writer/journalist Leslie GILMORE titled ''Belfast's Forgotten Tenor' is featured in the July-Aug 2004 issue of Dublin's "Ireland of the Welcomes" magazine. JOHNSTON, a butcher, left school to work in his father's butcher shop in Belfast's Sandy Row. As a teenager, he entered baritone competitions in music festivals and gained first place in all but one. At the Co. Antrim feis in 1923, the adjudicator told him, "I can't place you first because you're not a baritone; you're a tenor." The following day a member of the audience came to the shop and offered to pay for James to study tenor singing abroad. But his Methodist father bodily ejected the prospective benefactor from the shop saying, "No son of mine is going on the stage; it's the sure way to hell!" James continued to sing, but as a tenor. There is a nice magazine photo of James in his early days in Belfast as a member of the Cedar Quartet. He also sang in the 'Messiah' and 'Elijah' at venues throughout Ireland, and in June 1932, he sang at the Eucharistic Congress in Dublin. He was asked in 1940 by Commandant Bill O'KELLY of the Irish Army to sing the lead in a Dublin production of 'Faust' - a role which he turned down because he said he didn't know anything about opera or acting. He did agree to sing in 'Rigoletto,' the only opera he had seen, if the company should ever put it on. O'KELLY's response was - 'Rigoletto' it is. You'll sing the lead and you have two weeks to learn it." Later James sang the title role in 'Faust' that he had turned down and became a regular with Dublin Operatic Society In 1945, JOHNSTON, 43, was visited in his shop by Tyrone GUTHRIE, in charge of the Sadler's Wells Opera Company. in London. GUTHRIE was trying to revive opera after its demise during the war. He offered the tenor a place in the company, but JOHNSTON insisted on a leading role. GUTHRIE faced a monumental task in trying to persuade a war-weary population to fill his theatre, but JOHNSTON endeared himself to London audiences and was soon the company's principal tenor. One of his most memorable roles was in the title role of 'Hugh the Drover,' by Ralph Vaughan WILLIAMS. In the 1970s, his 'Song of the Road' from that work was included on EMI's 'Record of Singing' album featuring some of the world's greatest artists. An amazing story involves JOHNSTON's role of Manrico in 'Il Trovatore' in 1953 opposite the great Maria CALLAS who had been specially engaged for the occasion - the opening of the coronation season. Within weeks of opening night JOHNSTON had caused CALLAS to flounce from the stage, jeopardising a performance for which most of Europe's aristocracy had tickets. A scene in the production required JOHNSTON to push his illustrious leading lady away from him, but in rehearsal he overdid it and CALLAS stumbled and fell. Angrily, she pushed herself to her feet and told him, "How dare you. No one does that to Callas. If you do it again, I'll leave." Rather ungallantly JOHNSTON retorted, "I had to do it because it's in the production, but leave if you like and we'll get Joan SUTHERLAND. She could sing it better than you anyway." Miss CALLAS marched angrily from the theatre and out of the production. Sir David WEBSTER, Covent Garden's general manager plied Miss CALLAS with bouquets and chocolates - all of them in JOHNSTON's name. The ruse worked, and just three weeks after the coronation and the conquest of Everest, JOHNSTON reached the peak of his career in three performances of 'Il Trovatore' opposite the singer who was to become a legend. There were many high points in JOHNSTON's career, which you can read about in that issue which contains many nice photographs. Dublin singer Veronica DUNNE says that his proudest moment was when the two of them, from different faiths and opposite sides of the border, sang together at Britain's Covent Garden in a St. Patrick's Day performance. JOHNSTON's favourite operatic role was that of Calaf in Verdi's 'Turandot.'. Such was the Belfast tenor's rendering of 'Nessun dorma,' none shall sleep, that audiences often cut in with applause. James JOHNSTON sang for the last time in Covent Garden in July 1958 in a production of 'Carmen' and, back in his butcher's apron on his Belfast shop, he entertained customers with snatches of arias as he wrapped their meat. His final appearance was on the operatic stage in December of that year in 'Tosca' in Dublin, the city that had set him on the road to an illustrious career. JOHNSTON died in 1991 at the age of 88. Some fitting souvenirs of his singing include the 1998 reissue on CD of the 1946 'Messiah' and the 1995 CD of most of his operatic and Irish folk song recordings.