ATMOSPHERE

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 268, 2 February 1928, Page 16

ATMOSPHERE

A PERFORMER’S PLEA FOR HAPPIER CONCERTS

CURSE OF CONVENTION

rWritten for THE SUN) “For my part I like to see people smoking at their ease. I feel much happier when I am conducting before an audience obviously in carefree mood. I consider we have passed the days of the rigid conventionality which excluded informality in the presence of good music.” In giving his opinion upon the controversial subject of smoking in theatres, Sir Henry Wood advocated for Manchester the informal atmosphere of the London promenade concerts. It is really surprising that of all the detestable mid-Victorian habits handed down with the antimacassars apd family Bibles to a generation which obviously intended to have nothing to do with them, the frigid conventionality of the concert hall to-day should be the only reminder of a dull and very dreary past. On the score of politeness no fault can be found with our concert manners. Of our concert-goers it could not be said that they are not polite. They are excessively polite. It is a self-conscious politeness which dominates the atmosphere of the Town Hall like icicles in a freezing chamber. In comparison the cold draughts that sweep down the stairs from Queen Street and under the doors from Grey Avenue seem like ,‘the hot winds that come to thee.” The atmosphere, in more ways than one, is far from congenial. To the performer the death-chamber silence is only emphasised by the perfunctory ripple of applause that greets his, or her, appearance. The first impression is somewhat similar to that portrayed by Mr. Bateman of the man who crept into the Royal enclosure on Derby day with a bowler hat on. But for the fact that the performer realises that the audience is doing its best he would follow liis inclinations, and, apologising for the intrusion, take himself off as rapidly as possible. A NIGHTMARE It is a nightmare of faces. Hundreds of them —that is, of course, providing it is a subscription concert. Bored faces, languid faces, critical faces, and. in winter time, cold faces with blue* noses. Somewhere or another the faces have bodies—cold bodies tucfked away somewhere in the gloom and with numbed toes somewhere at the end of them. But that does not matter —it is the faces that count. To the nervous performer the eternal wonder is that the faces have bothered to come. In their own way some of them probably enjoy it. Some of the faces turn to other faces in the next row. More than likely they are explaining that “someone had to come with mother.” Other faces are those of “patrons of the arts.” When all is over, and the tumult and the shouting dies, the faces connect themselves with bodies as they rise for the King. Then they go outside and catch their trams. By all means let the faces smoke. Perchance they will fade away in a blue mist of tobacco smoke; a veil between thee and me through which none can see. Then will come only the sound of the joyous “hand,” given by a contented “house,” disposed to reflect, and —be kind.

“His Master’s Voice” has issued an orchestral record of Wagner music, the “Lohengrin” Prelude, played by the London Symphony Orchestra, and the record is of oarticular importance, because the performance was directed by Siegfried Wagner, the son of the composer. The close relationship between conductor and composer gives a valuable interest to this interpretation, „