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Show WHY ARE PIANO RECITALS? A man sitting between his womenfolk women-folk at a piano recital last week suggested sug-gested the question. Why are piano recitals? There was a hunted look in his eyes, betimes he feverishly examined ex-amined the exits. Anywhere, anywhere out of the M I didn't know this martyr to tu I'tistic aspirations of his family, yet vhen his glance signalled sig-nalled to me S. O .S. my masculine freemasonry prompted me to throw out a lifeline in the symbolic manner H best known to all good men and true. H But, alas! I was a fellow-convict row- H ing in the same musical gallery of H vain regrets. So I fell to tugging at my H oar, i. e., my program, wherein I noted H with dismay that it was only the sixth H movement of a prodigious sonata, and H as the thirteen-voiced fugue pitilessly H pelted my oar-drums as pelts hail on H the roof of a sensitive hothouse a wave I of pity, not unmixed with indignation, VH welled up from my sub-conscious self, H and again I propounded the query, H f Why are piano recitals? H j A young person or persons of vari- H ous sexes sit before a huge coffin H r whose open maw is furnished with fe- H rocious appearing white and black H tooth. Little wonder that Barnum's Hg educated elephant wept when con- M" fronted by a concert grand pianoforte. Hi The filial animal recognized the tusky H remains of its mother in the ivory Hr keyboard. Some of us feel like imi- J tating that elephant as we hear the 1 ghosts of Bach, Beethoven and Chopin m walling under the steely fingertips of B youthful piano virtuosi. My old quip m about being butchered to make a piano m manufacturer's holiday does not apply M in every case; but the best of instru- B ments ceases to give forth mellow m tones when attacked by a harmonious Hi, blacksmith. The limitations of the Hi pianoforte are obvious. The greatest Hi artist is the one who creates the illu- HJ sion of sustained tone, where such a H quality exists not. Strictly speaking, Hr Liszt, Rubenstein, Hauslg, Essipowa, B Joseffy, Godowsky, Hofmann, Do Pach- Hn mann and Paderewski did not, and do HI not, play on an instrument of porcus- Hi sion. HI. The hard impact of the hammer on HI the wires is dissimulated, and this dls- Hg simulation was and is the very essence H of their art. Not to smash the keys HP is the first law in the commonwealth Hj of tone. How many observe this law? Hi Obsessed by the idea of orchestral Hij style, tonal values are sacrificed to Hlj sheer volume. The shibboleth of the H hour is weight. Bach must be played H - with weight. It was reported a distin- Hji guiBhed characteristic of Beethoven's H manner, and long ago Amy Fay told HI us of Deppe's axiom: play with weight. H Instinctively all the stars in the "plan- H istic" constellation, above all Thai- i berg, employed the triceps in the pro Hf duction of a rich, full tone. Tho Dutch Hi virtuoso, Martinus Sieveking, asserts Hi without fear of contradiction that he Hi can impart the secret of weight in oikj H hour; but he was a famous athlete as H well as a pianist; nevertheless, the H crux of the question still remains. You H may play with Aveight, but If you are H not mus 7 your tone, notwithstand- Ilng Its aantity, will not ravish the ear. It Is quality that rules, precious and elusive quality. And in all the K Seven Arts. M Apart from the natural desire to m live, to make a display, and win fame, R the pianist is prompted to give recitals Hi because inner necessity is the master. It In such instances we get a Quiomar m Novaes or an Augusta oCttlow not to M drag in Velasquez, Bauer, and Gabrilo- 1 witsch. Then you listen to genuine M music played with emotion and Intel- H llgenco. You are spiritually refreshed. B In the huge, noisy, whirling kaleido- H scope of life a piano recital is an oasis. M You forgot for the nonce the horrors, m vulgarities, and petty monotonies of n daily existence. And sometimes you don't; that is, when a muscular youth M or maiden brutally unmasks the inti- B mate soul of the pianoforte. If two- m thirds of our piano-playing public Hi could be persuaded to avoid public H performances, and If the major portion H of the remaining third were forbidden Hi under penalty of internment to attempt Chopin, the present scribe would enjoy a peace beyond all understanding. However, he does not anticipate the millennium just yet. J. G. H., Town Talk. |
