MR LUND’S CONCERT.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 1005, 14 September 1877, Page 2

MR LUND’S CONCERT.

It is with sincere pleasure we are able to ! chronicle a very considerable success acliieved by Mr Lund, at the Oddfellows’ Hall, last evening. The audience certainly was not numerous, but it was in the highest degree appreciative. The programme was in many • ways worthy of commendation; its length j was reasonable and enjoyable, and its conI tents comprised a variety of items which, in j point of artistic excellence, have rarely been heard here. Mr Lund was himself the chief performer, I appearing no less than six times. His first i effort was Mendelssohn’s celebrated (r minor j Concerto (op. 25), in which he was assisted i by Mr R. Darker, who very ably filled in the ; the orchestral parts on the harmonium. Mr , Lund has most fluent execution, his running I passages being liquid, smooth, and clear; j and, having great wrist power, his octaves and chords are forcible and decided. There was much delicacy in his performance, though unfortunately many of the most graceful parts were sadly blurred by a too abundant use of the open pedal. Mr Lund showed considerable depth of feeling in his reading of the works performed, though sometimes indeed it was in point of expression at variance with the text' Liszt’s masterly transcriptions of Schubert’s songs was represented by “ Faith in Spring ” and the “Erl King,” The former was all that could be desired, but the latter piece was scarcely so happily rendered, clearness being sacrificed to fierce energy. Chopin is nob always easy of interpretation. Much of his music is based upon popular dance forms ; but he, instead of being bound down to their level, raises them to himself, and exalts them to the highest pinnacle of eminence, filling them to repletion full of grace and beauty. Rut the intensity of emotion with which they are suffused, and the copious amount of ornate configurations with which they are embellished, make their interpretation exceedingly difficult, for in seeking to render these full justice the performer is liable to lose sight of the rythmical figure of their "round-form. It was here that Mr Lhfid, like so many others, failed ; and indeed we are inclined to think this his weak point; although a clear enunciation of natural rythm should be oue of the chief aims of a performer, for without rythm, music is but a chaos of sound. However, to cavil at one shortcoming, where so much was excellent, were hypercritical; and Mr Lund is a musician to he welcomed amongst us. The three piano duets of Schumann, iu which Mr Lund was efficiently assisted by Mrs Von Haast, were simply delicious, both in themselves and in performance. Me have not space to speak of the other items in the programme, and our morning contemporaries have already enumerated them; suffice to suy that the opening duet of Mozart (Variations in Gf) was executed in finished style by Mrs You Haast and Miss fugles ; and that Miss Ada Taylor was very successful in her two songs; as was also Df, Voy iUkpt iiv’eUiOYttu'e “Miguoy.”