CONCERT TOURS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 860, 2 January 1930, Page 14

CONCERT TOURS

Visits Arranged for This Year BACKHAUS AND AUSTRAL Australian tours by Wilhelm Backhaus, Jan Kubelik, Florence Austral, and a boy prodigy named Wolfi are announced for 1930. With New Zealand’s musical reputation sunk to the depths, it remains to be seen whether they will all visit this country. Backhaus, the famous pianist, wh'o played in Auckland about five years ago, is to open his tour at Sydney on Easter Saturday. Under the J. and N. Tait management. Kubelik will begin his season ir Melbourne about the end of March or the beginning of April. This great violinist toured New Zealand about 20 years ago, when his

fame was at its height. He is now not a regular concert performer, but none the less a great virtuoso. At IIS years Kubelik was a pupil of Sevcik. who has also trained Wolti, the violinist prodigy. E. J. Carroll is directing tours by Florence Austral, the eminent Australian soprano, and by Wolfi, the 14-year-old violinist who is now attracting the attention of Europe. London audiences first heard the boy last month, when he appeared in his shirtsleeves at the Albert Hall. They were indebted for his visit to the Baron von Franckenstein. the Austrian Minister. Wolfi’s London debut w as made after a series of highly successful recitals in the provinces. The fates dealt hardly with Wolti, who was born during the second year of the Great War, and during the remaining years of the war had a very precarious existence. Happily, however, he has survived, and will become, largely through the Red Cross Society and Sevcik. the eminent teacher, a successor (it is said in Europe) of Heifetz. Elman and the rest. His London programmes included the Bach Chaconne, Ernst’s showy Concerto in F Sharp Minor, and the Max Bruch Concerto in G Minor. Technically, his )lay was all that could be desired, but “it would be flattery to say that he grasped the full emotional significance of the works."

To honour Sir Frederick Delius, Sir Thomas Beecham arranged a festival of his music at the Queen’s Hall London, that lasted a fortnight. Delius has become quite blind, but he was obviously happy when sitting listening to his splendid compositions. He was born in England, of German parents, spent his youth in Florida, and has lived for years In France. Sir Thomas Beecham says that Delius is one of the greatest composers of all time.