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Show Musicians Are the Funniest People: Adelina Pattl asked $100,000 for t cerUin three-month tour. 'But," ob-Jectid ob-Jectid an Impresario, "that's mor I than the President gets!" . . . "Well," shrugged the diva, "ther get the President." . . . Liszt wai 'a character who wore the same kind of clothes whether the weather wai rainy or fair. ... "I never," h declared, "take notice of that whict , takes no notice of me." . . . Hande composed so fast, they say, that the Ink on the top of the page of hii manuscript had not dried by th time he reached the bottom. . . . Another gag of the day: "Do yor. like Brahms?" ... "I don't know. What are they?" . . . "Aftei Strauss what?" an English jour nalist once queried. "For ont thing," music oracle Leonard Leib ling noted, "the critics." A Journalist objected to the 7 a. m. piano playing in the room next to his in a Milan hotel. "Do you always allow that?" he asked. . . . "Not as a rule," they told him, "but we make an exception with Mr. Verdi." ... It was the late Alexander Woollcott who deflated a famous soprano boasting of her execution ex-ecution of an aria she described as "difficult." . . . "Difficult!" groaned Woollcott. "I wish it had been impossible!" im-possible!" ... At a Peabody concert con-cert President Grant once observed: "I know only two tunes. One is 'Yankee Doodle' and the other Isn't." When Rossini heard Wagner's I "Lohengrin" for the first time, j he said: "One cannot judge a work upon a single hearing and I have no intention of hearing hear-ing this a second time." ... A German critic once wrote that "Wagner was a good musician, but he left behind the Wagner-ltes, Wagner-ltes, which was most unkind of him." . . "In order to compose," com-pose," said Schumann, "it is just enough to remember a tune which nobody else has thought of." . . . When Albert Spaulding ' toured through the West one Winter, he told a theater manager man-ager that his violin was 200 ' years old. . . . "Don't say anything any-thing about it," replied the impresario, im-presario, "and maybe the audience audi-ence won't know the difference." Paderewski, when still quite unknown, un-known, went to London armed with letters of introduction to influential Britishers. "Dear Prince," one said, "the bearer, Ignace Paderewski, is a fiery young Pole and rather charming when he doesn't play the piano, for which he has little talent." tal-ent." . . . Paderewski, unless a press agent of the day is fooling us, once accosted a polo player with the question: "What is the difference differ-ence between us?" The other shrugged. "You," grinned Ignace, "are a good soul who plays polo. I am a good Pole who plays solo." . . . Grunfeld was caught by the father of one of his pupils kissing the girl. "Is this," stormed the parent, par-ent, "what I am paying for?" . . . "No," replied the famous tutor, "I do this free." A young man approached Mozart Mo-zart and asked him how to write a symphony. "You're a very young fellow," the composer told him, "why not begin with a ballad?" . . . "But," pouted the youth, "you composed symphonies sympho-nies when you were ten." ... "Yes," smiled Mozart, "but I didn't ask how." . . . Dr. Samuel Johnson admitted once he did not care for music. "But of all noises," he added, "I think music mu-sic is the least disagreeable." ... A young lady auditioned on the piano for Rubinstein. "What," she asked him at the end of the selection, "should I do now?" Snapped Rubinstein: "Get married!" Chopin, whose life Columbia brings to the screen in "A Song to j Remember," could give more than : the piano "the finger." He was a dinner guest in a Parisian home one night and, after the meal, was asked by the hostess to play some of his compositions. "But, madame," said Chopin, "I have eaten so little!" lit-tle!" ... He once cracked to Liszt: "I prefer not to play in public; pub-lic; it unnerves me. You, if you cannot charm the audience, can at ! least astonish them." . . . When DePachman mislaid his false teeth someone appropriately observed: "His Bach is better than his bite." . . . To a young pianist, Nellie Melba remarked: "You have talent, presence, charm. AU you need now to make a success is a nice hot scandal." Mascagnl heard an organ grinder murdering an aria from his famous "Cavalleria Rusticana" and ran out i of his house to show him the proper speed to crank out the melody. Next day the organ grinder carried a sign on the organ: "Pupil of Mas-cagni" Mas-cagni" . . . Liszt paid women 25 , francs to faint at an appointed time j(a swoonster! ). He would promptly prompt-ly and gallantly dash from his key-' key-' board and pick up the swoonee. lOnce, a hired fainter forgot her cue I nnd Liszt, very upset, swooned him-j him-j self. |