THINGS TO COME

New Zealand Listener, Volume 9, Issue 216, 13 August 1943, Page 2

THINGS TO COME

A Run Through The Programmes

MONDAY ‘HAT exactly is a "Handy Mood"? Is it the mood you feel in when you begin disembowelling the radio? Or is it the mood adopted by your wife when she wants the kitchen sink drain investigated? It certainly would be handy to be able to turn on that air of sweet persuasion at the first indication that the roof guttering was blocked or that the slide through into the kitchen needed a few hours’ attention. But whatever temperamental gymnastics may be evolved within the sacred confines of the Englishman’s castle, we can’t think how the handy mood can be translated into a musical session "For My Lady." For the answer, listen to 2YA, at 10.45 a.m. next Monday Also worth notice: ; 1YA, 7.15 p.m.: The Brooding and Rearing of Chickens. tYA, 7.15 p.m.:; Revolution on the FarmWinter Course Talk. $YA, 9.25 p.m.: Trio No. 2 (Haydn). 4YA, 8.41 p.m.: Serenade for 13 Wind In struments (Mozart). TUESDAY /[F Dr. C. M. Focken, of Dunedin, uses _ the same sources of information as we have just turned to, he will tell 4YA listeners who tune in to him on Tuesday August 17, that the biggest producer of gold in the world is South Africa, of silver Mexico, of platinum Canada, and of diamonds the Belgian Congo. They will know without being told that the United States are richest in coal, France in iron, and Canada in nickel, But they will not necessarily know what all this has to do with the Atlantic Charter, and it will be Dr. Focken’s job to explain that mystery It may not be so difficult as it sounds since the Atlantic Ocean reaches from one end of the world to the other. and forms part of the coastline of all those mineral-producing countries But if the war had been a ‘scramble for minerals to begin with, it ‘might have. been confined to the Atlantic half of the world, and if the Atlantic Charter had been based on ‘minerals, it might not have interested Russia or China. But listen to what Dr. Focken has to say «t 7.15 p.m. Also worth notice: iYX, 840 om.: "Till’s Merry Pranks" (Strauss). 2YA, 10.40 a.m,: "The Bee in Yous Bonnet." 3YA, &.40 p.m.: Concert aboard the Pamir. WEDNESDAY CAUTIONING children has been a habit of parents ever since our ancestors warned little Walla-walla and Gilly-gilly that the bears would get them if they strayed from the cave mouth. The first admonitions were followed up doubtless with tales of how nothing was left of little Punkey but a thumb length of bone, and all because he did not do what Mother and Father, Grandmother and Grandfather said. Mamma and Papa of Victorian days issued threats in pictorial’ and verse form to the child -who sucked his thumb, walked with head-in-air, failed’ to wash behind his ears, or refused his soup. But alas! modern cautions have lost their venom. Mum and Dad read cautionary tales to their young; but not to change their- habits or to save their skins, but to encourage a sense of humour. The last sting is removed from the tale when it is set to music. All the same it is grown-ups

— rather than children who derive enjoyment from them and that is perhaps why you will have to wait until 10.0 p.m. to hear four of Hilaire Belloc’s "Cautionary Tales" set to music from 1YA. Also worth notice: 2YC, 8.0 p.m.: Music from America 3YA, 9.30 p.m.: Symphony No. 4 (Sibelius). 4Y¥ Oo. 8.0 p.m.: Russian Symphonic Programme. THURSDAY OME like serials and some have serials thrust upon them; others again go and have a bath when the family insist on the next instalment. So we fancy that on Thursday evenings half the listening households are well satisfied and the other half either very disgruntled or very clean. Thursday is serial night for three of the main stations. From 1YA you may hear "Bright Horizon," "Parker

ot ‘the Yard," or "The Inside Story." From 2YA you may hear "Lost Property" sandwiched between "Rainbow Rhythm" and "Hometown Variety." And from 3YA you may hear "The Big Four," "McGlusky the Filibuster," and "The Phantom Drummer." Some serial lovers will regret that they have only one radio set and one pair of ears. Also worth notice: 2YA, 9.40 v.m.: Trio No. 5, Op. 70 (Bee thoven). 2YC, 8.0 p.m.: "Among the Moderns" (Chamber Music), 4+YA, 9.25 p.m.: Symphony No. 1 in E Minor (Sibelius). FRIDAY ORE than one? tie with the nine teenth century was broken by the death, a few months ago, of Sergei Rachmaninoff, the Russian composer. Not only was he a survivor of the old Russia, with personal memories of Tchaikovski and Arensky; he was a romantic. untouched by any modernism later than Liszt’s; and in a third sense he was 4 living link with the past, for he belonged to the waning tradition of composer virtuoso. Recordings will be heard from 1YA at 8.15 p.m. and 8.31 p.m. of the composer playing two short pieces of his own composition. Of Rachmaninoff’s piano-music, The Times said, in an obituary tribute, "He knew every kind of sound that could come out of a piano. and for sheer euphony and enchantment of sound... he had no equal in his seneration. It is this sound-saturation this richness of musical imagery, that -ommands admiration for his concertos." Also worth notice: 1YA, 7.30 p.m.: Studio Orchestra, 4YA, 9.31 p.m.: Readings from Coleridge (Prof. T. B: Adams

SATURDAY RITISH music of the last 50 years, from Elgar to Walton, from music¢ based on folk-song to music based on jazz, will be the fare of listeners to 2YC and 3YL on Saturday, August 21. Both stations will present programmes of music by British composers, 2YC from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m., and 3YL from 9.0 p.m. to 10° p.m. Wellington listeners will start off ‘with Elgar’s second symphony, and at 8.51 and 8.56 they will hear Gustav Holt’s music. Station 3YL will broadcast his "Planets" suite in its entirety at 9.16 pm. Then at 9 p.m, there will be Constant Lambert’s choralorchestral setting of Sacheverell Sitwell’s poem "The Rio Grande," in which he used devices from the jazz idiom, followed by George Butterworth’s setting of poems from Housman’s "A Shropshire Lad." After playing Delius’ Rhapsody on an English folksong, Brigg Fair, 2YC will close its programme with three short pieces by Bax, Harty, and Walton. Also worth notice: 1YA, 8.6 p.m.: Royal Auckland Choir. 2YA, 11 a.m.: Talk on Sigrid Undset. 3YA, 7.30 p.m.: The Windsor Trio. SUNDAY ERDI’S Requiem Mass which is to be presented in parts from Station 2YN, Nelson, starting at 7 p.m. on Sunday, August 22, is one of only ten or eleven compositions that Verdi produced apart from his operas, and even then it was at first criticised for theatricalism. Its origin lay in an attempt by Verdi to arrange for himself and 13 other leading Italian composers to collaborate in a memorial to Rossini; the scheme fell through, and Verdi kept his own contribution (the Libera me) to become later the basis of this Requiem, written in commemoration of the Italian writer Manzoni. The music’s impassioned sincerity and its sheer loveliness overcame the prejudices of those who saw an intrusion of theatrical mannerisms into a religious ceremony, and established the Mass so that it is regarded, not merely as one of Verdi’s own best works, but as one of the best things cf its kind. Also worth notice: sie 9.33 p.m.: Opera "The Masked Ball" (Verdi). ; 2YA, 9.42 p.m.: Play, "The Ship" (St. John -Irvine)._ sYA. 3 p.m.: Great Contemporary Poetry, ‘y 7