MUSIC

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 374, 7 June 1928, Page 14

MUSIC

(By

F.1.R.)

The Polish-American pianist, Leopold Godowsky, Elena Gerhardt, and the Flonzaley Quartet, have been distinguished visitors to London during the past month. Backhaus, who is due to return to New Zealand next year, has recently given two notable concerts at the Milan Conservatorium. * + * Among the revivals at the Staatsoper, Berlin, are Handel’s “Ezio” (a w ork by which the composer introduced the famous singer, Montagnana to London), and Gounod’s “The Mock Doctor,” known in Germany as “Der Arzt wider willen.” Of its texture, one of the Berlin critics quotes SaintSaens as having said that “Gounod caught the spirit of Moliere and wrote the music with the pen of Mozart.”

The Daily Chronicle complains a& the lymphatic attitude of the IWMilih Labour Party toward music. When the Italian Fascists wanted a labour song, they commissioned Mascagni, their most famous composer to watte one which has been produced in Naples with an enormous chorus and orchestra. W hen the British Labour Party wanted a tune for “The Red Flag,” it adopted the German folk-song “O Tannenbaum,” otherwise “O Fir Tree.”

Lilli Lehman one of the finest of W agnerian %jfd German Lieder singers, will celebrate her eightieth birthday during 1928, a£ will also Hans vpn Wolzogen, the biographer and friend of Richard Wagner, who lives at Bayreuth. Dr. Ludwig Wullner, the famous actor-singer, and Seigfried Ochs, the celebrated choral conductor of Berlin, will celebrate their seventieth year during 1928. Richard Strauss will be sixty-five years old on June 10.

Since the announcement of the Schubert centennial many persons have appeared, claiming relationship to the composer, only one of whom has established the authenticity of his claim. He is Ignatz Stuppock, 69 years old, who is in destitute circumstances, living in poor lodgings in Vienna on a dole for the unemployed granted by the Austrian Government. He is the grandnephew of Schubert, his mother being Theresa Schubert Stuppock, the composer’s niece, who nursed Schubert through his illnesses, she a child of 12 and Schubert in his twenties. Theresa was the daughter of Franz’s brother, Ferdinand.

Benno Moisiewitsch, the famous pianist, who has just concluded a remarkably successful tour of the East, speaks highly of the interest manifested in music in that part of the world. “In the East Indies the concerts are well patronised by the Dutch; in the Philippines there are Latin and Spanish elements, tremendously keen; and in China —Shanghai, Hong-Kong, and Tsien Tsien—there is a very large population eagerly welcoming; music. As for Japan, it is a remarkable fact that 90 per cent of. the people there will flock for five nights in the week to hear classical programmes. The Japanese, who are keen imitators of Western culture, encourage music enthusiastically, and are interested, not only in the clasr sics, but in the works of the modern composers.” Moisiewitsch will play in Auckland on June ,19.

The great Australian tenor, Mr. Alfred O’Shea, always includes in his programmes a number of operatic arias, and his magnificent voice and Italian training have made him famous on the operatic stage, but he does not neglect the songs that are dear to the hearts of all. A recent recital in Sydney was reported thus: “Coates’ ‘Fairy Tales of Ireland’ brought out a beautiful quality of pathos and richness of tone that proclaimed the artist to be in the front rank of the world’s singers to-day. ‘I Hear a Thrush at Eve’ (Cadman) was a number eminently suited to the tenor, who, in the softer passages, was just as excellent as when singing fortissimo. Several other items were beautifully rendered by the artist. Among these were ‘The Low Backed Car/ ‘A Dream,* ‘Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms,’ ‘Maeushla* (in which Mr. O’Shea’s ■wonderful mezzo voice tones were shown in their most beautiful quality) and ‘Ben Bolt,’ the sweet, sad, old English song that almost everycme knows.” Mr. O’Shea will sing in Auckland this month.