PACHMANN BEATS TIME AT ALBERT HALL

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 434, 16 August 1928, Page 14

PACHMANN BEATS TIME AT ALBERT HALL

A STOP-WATCH TURN YOUNG AT EIGHTY Six thousand delighted people welcomed Pachmann, the inimitable 80-year-old genius, at the Albert Hall and Pachmann, in return, gave them a delightful Chopin recital, aa tics, a dance, innumerable speeches, and a record stop-watch performanu of the popular Valse in D flat major, wrote the “Daily Express” music critic, recently. A smile of triumph lit his features as he greeted his audience. He took out his watch as he sat down. Then forth poured the notes, a flight of waves of rippling music.' It was over. Out came Pachmann’s watch again. He jumped from his seat. "Fifty - live sec onds!” he shoutec in schoolboy glee “Fifty-five seconds! Only fifty-five!” At the end of thi Mazurka in B fla minor the wonder ful and eccentrii musician took ui his coat-tails anc danced a step o two. It was don< as if it were part o his musical per formance. He whirreu uum me nines into the dance. After the interval he whispered a great announcement: “I have had my hair cut.” It was true. There were fewer locks than usual, but the six thousand loved him all the same, and a girls’ school in white jumpers, who lined three or four rows against the organ, went wild with delight. There were supreme difficulties that had to be overcome at the start. A spot-light, in which the ordinary artist would have delighted, shed a ray on the piano. Pachmann would not play a note till it was turned off. He would rather play in the dusk. The piano-stool, of course, was not the required height. This was adjusted. Then he dived suddenly into his afternoon’s work. His marvellous memory never missed a note, his lingers chased each other up and down the keys, and the soul of Pachmann pervaded all. He came tripping on in hurried excitement to play the Prelude in B minor, and then suddenly halted to show his audience, with many gesticulations, how he proposed to play the twiddly bits. Will it be Pachmann’s “absolutely final” appearance in London? His heart would probably break if he really realised it was to be. He is so young a soul of music yet. Only eighty.

Better opera at cheaper prices is a decision of Sir Benjamin Fuller and Mr. John Fuller. The Gonsalez brothers will bring another company to Australia and New Zealand early next autumn.