MUSIC NOTES

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVII, Issue 8343, 1 February 1913, Page 11

MUSIC NOTES

A NEW VIOLIN VIRTUOSO. A quite unusual success was won last month by a new violin virtuoso. Herr Daniel Melsa, a . boyish, modest-lookmn player, who braved the exacting critics oi Berlin and the usually oHti ca |. au , enco of the Beethoven Hall lor his first public concert. 1 “The venture was perhaps audacious,’’ writes the Bondou “‘Scandard," “for although the Berlin music-goers do not care to act merely as eucoisers of the opinion of other centres, they also do .fljbt care to trouole much about unknown quantities, but tho undertaking certainly seemed more than justified. No doubt several of the audience rtraembered the sensation tnat the boy caused at the annual competition ot the Scbarwenka Academy two years ago, when he won the prize violin out or hand, and others, too, must have known something of his romantic career, but few can have been prepared for such ripe talent and undoubted musical fascination. The technique was not alone the source of the success of the -nterpretaUon. Tho plain or simple programme, rather hackneyed it seemed on papery the “Max Biuch Concerto in G minor, tho Brahams’ ‘Concerto in D major’ (Op. 71), and the ‘Paganini in D major —was in itself an appeal for technical skill, as each piece was familiar to all who had heard the virtuosi ot the day, but although the bow-ing and fingering and the sense of rhythm and colour were all far beyond tho usual, and gave the player title to very hight rank in his profession, there seemed no doubt that the greatest appeal came from the indefinable -°ulthing which was beyond the analysis of ordinary criticism. Tho playing was undoubtedly spontaneous to a degree, and r jL' was the applause, and both the violinist and his popular success were quite out of th-3 ordinary." MELSA'S CAREER. Daniel Melsa is not yet 20 years of age. Like so many others of the Polish race, he was born a musician. A native el Warsaw, he showed talent from his earliest childhood. His parents were too poor to give him a musical education, but when lie was seven they migrated >o f.ndz, where his father bought him a little violin. On this ho taught himself ts picx out melodies. Ons day a wellknown Lodz profesiir heard him playing and was so struck with the child’s ability that he advised his father to give him a thoroughly musical education. With some difficulty this advice was followed, and little Melsa soon made such swift progress in his art that after a year's tuition his teacher could teach him no more. At the ago of nine the boy was admitted to the school of Professor Grndzinski, where he remained two years. Then came the terrible "pegrom" at Lodz in 1905. in which young Melsa lost his father and little sister, who were killed by Cossacks in the streets. Sympathetic friends sent the widowed mother and son to Berlin, whore young Melsa was admitted free of charge into the Klindworth-Schwarenka Conservatoire of Music. There he studied the violin, and in 1909 Won the prize violin in competition. Many influential patrons now took a strong interest in the youth, and by subscription a genuine Bergonzi violin, dated 1727, was bought, for him at a cost of £1230. At the same time his mother it as placed out of the reach of want. A new master was found for him in Professor Karl Flesch, who taught him for art’s sake alone. One of the leaders in this movement was Mrs Hill, wife of the former United States Ambassador at Berlin, and among subscribers were Edouard Arnhold, F. von Mendelssohn, Herr Bleichroder, W. von Siemens, Arthur Ballin, Jacob Schiff, Otto Kahn, and Edwin D. Adams. KUBELIK IN TROUBLE. Kubelik, the famous violinishTwho performed before a crowded audience in Berlin, on December 11th, read several

rather adverse criticisms in. the Berlin papers the following morning. He had also had to submit to the mortiication of having his favourite Guarnerius violin seized by a bailiff as satisfaction for a judgment for <£9lo given against him in the British courts for breach of contract- The bailiff called at the hotel in Enter den Linden where Kubelik mas staying, and after waiting for the artist to dress he served a writ of seizure foi the amount of £I2OO, which corresponds to the judgment and costs. The Guar nerius, ho thought, was the most suitable pledge to hold while awaiting payment, being valued at £2OOO, and this the bailiff carried away under his arm, attracting much attention as he passec through a throng of Kubelik’s admirers, who were waiting on. the pavement to see the groat player go to luncheeon. Many, indeed, mistook him for Kubelik's servant. OPEBA CLASSES. “Somebody ought really to compile a list of operas, dividing them into two .classes, ‘moral’ and ‘immoral,’ for the guidance of the young,’’ writes the Loudon “Daily Telegraph.” "Of course England being a strictly moral country, the people who managed our operatic affairs in the long ago decided that it was best, in. order to avoid any possible trouble, to have all operas perforiued in some language that very few members of the public would understand, and thereafter grow up the convenient tradition, which only the strong and the brave have ever ventured to oppose, that English is an unsingablo language, utterly unfitted for opera or anything oven half as respectable. And, if ever the day comes when all that is changed, it is fervently to bo hoped that some —indeeel, many—operatic libretti will be entirely rewritten, so as to avoid the smallest risk of outraging the feelings of Mrs Grundy anil her tribe.”