THINGS TO COME

New Zealand Listener, Volume 8, Issue 199, 16 April 1943, Page 2

THINGS TO COME

A Run Through The Programmes

MONDAY OR seven weeks a series of quarterhour recitals from "The WellTempered Clavier" has been providing the listeners to Station 3YL with an opportunity to get better acquainted with something that many great musicians have declared should be every com--poser’s daily bread. Written by J. S. ‘Bach to test a newly-developed system of tuning for key-board instruments, whereby one instrument might be used for playing in any of 12 major and 12 minor keys, "The ‘Well-Tempered Clavier" is a collection of 48 preludes and 48 fugues, in two books, of which the second was completed 22 years after the first. Among the preludes are all sorts of music from gay toccatas to majestic sarabandes, and the fugues include some of Bach’s most magnificent musical structures, Station 3YL broadcasts these at 8 o'clock on Monday evenings. Also worth notice: 1YA, 7.15 p.m.: Talk to Farmers. 2YA, 84 p.m.: Grieg: Violin Sonata (Studio). 3ZR, 9.25 p.m.: Beethoven: Violin Concerto, 4YA, 7.57 p.m.: Masterpieces of Music (Wagner). TUESDAY : F Sir Arnold Bax (Master of the King’s Musick), Igor Stravinsky, and Sir Edward Elgar seem strange company in a quarter-hour programme (2YA, 7.30 p.m.), they are there because @ collection of pieces designed to illustrate the music of the twentieth century necessarily throws such different types into one another’s presence. "From the Columbia History of Music" is the name of the programme: it starts with a piano piece, "Paean," by Bax, in the form of a passacaglia, then an excerpt from "The Wedding," a cantata for voices with two pianos and percussion by Stravinsky, "Sospiri" (Sighs), by Elgar, and finally ‘a song by Ravel, called "The Enchanted Flute." Also worth notice: ee 7s p.m.: SchostakovicH: Symphony °°. e 3ZR, p.m.: Recital by Yehudi Menuhin, 4YA, 8.0 p.m.: St. Kilda Band (Studio). WEDNESDAY EADERS of The Listener have already read about the sort of things that happen when the Army Education and Welfare Service sends one of its light concert parties to military camps in the North Island, and listeners to 2YA have enjoyed many broadcasts by the 2YA concert party from a_ military

camp. In response to the rousing welcomes that visiting artists receive from the soldiers they go to entertain, the Welfare Service is now spreading its work in the widest field, and on Wednesday the listeners of 3YA who tune in

at 7.30 p.m. will hear a light concert from a military camp in the South Island. Algo worth notice: 1YA, 8-9.0 p.m.: Music by Mozart and Haydn. 2YA, 8.33 p.m.: "Best Sellers’ (Studio). 3YA, 8.45 p.m.; Music by Franz Schreker, 4YO, 8.0 p.m.: Symphony by Albert Roussel. THURSDAY ISTENERS in the North Island who can hear both 1YA and 2YA will have the opportunity on Thursday evening to listen to two outstanding examples of modern English song-writing by two composers who died before their work had reached its full maturity. George Butterworth, who was killed in the last war, made sympathetic settings of poems from A. E. Housman’s Shropshire Lad. Peter Warlock, who committed suicide in 1930, made a setting of poems by W. B. Yeats in a cycle called The Curlew, which was indirectly responsible for making Yeats withdraw his objections to musical settings of his verse. The Warlock comes from 1YX at 8.32 p.m., the Butterworth from 2YA at 9.38 p.m. : Also worth notice: — 9.25 p.m.: Haagen Holenbergh (pian3YA, 9.25 p.m.: Dance music-Frankie Masters, 4YA, 8.0 p.m.: Schumann’s Symphony No. 4. . 4YZ, 10.0 p.m.: Review of Riverton Races. FRIDAY ‘THis year Good Friday falls on’ St. George’s Day (April 23), which is also Shakespeare’s birthday. For this occasion the NBS are producing a feature entitled "The Great Englishman," which will be heard from 2YA at 8 p.m. From a casual remark in a train two people begin a discussion on Shakespeare and what we owe to him and how much of our everyday language is directly derived from him. You may be as astonished as they are to find how much of our speech is culled direct from plays that we thought we had finished with the schoolroom. There is also a surprisingly large number of composers who have gone to Shakespeare for inspiration or for words. Some of these settings to Shakespeare’s lyrics will be included in the programme,

Also worth notice: 1YA, 9.37 p.m.: Mozart’s Concerto for Flute rp. 3YA, 7.30 p.m? Bach’s "St. Matthew Music (Wagner). 4YZ, 8.0 p.m.: Stainer’s "Crucifixion." SATURDAY LICE IN WONDERLAND may stand the test of time, but can it stand being murdered any better than Time (who, you will remember, took the strongest exception to this treatment)? And murder would seem to be indicated when Slaughter thé adaptor gets busy on Carrol the author. It just remains to be seen or heard (3YA, 9.25 p.m., April 24) whether Arthur Askey (whom we are sure is mad enough to be the hatter), and Robertson Hare (who we hope will be the March Hare, if only to keep the punning game going a little longer), really redeem the situation. But if we do think the BBC has put butter in the works, we can at least console ourselves that it was the best butter. Also worth notice: 1YA, 8.7 p.m.: Light recitals from the Studio. 2YA, 11.0 p.m.: Talk by Mrs. J. F, Nathan: "O. Henry." 4YA, 9.25 p.m.: Old-time dance programme, SUNDAY ‘TRADITIONS die hard, but they also take a long time to come to birth, Old countries have traditions which have grown over thousands of years. New countries like Australia and New Zealand have tended to jettyson some of the traditions inherited from England, and they have not yet built up many of their own. But we have one tradition of our own that arose in the last war and is strengthened by this war. It is the theme of an NBS feature "The Anzac Tradition," which may be heard from 2YA on April 25 . (which, of course, is also Easter Sunday). The subtitle is "One Increasing Purpose," and that needs no com.nent. Also worth nocice: 1YA, 9.33 p.m.: "Orpheus and Eurydice" (Gluck). 2YA, 9.32 p.m.: ‘fRomeo and Juliet." 3YA, 8.15 p.m.: Modern English Music, 4YA, 2.15 p.m.: Beethoven Septet, Op. 20.