THINGS TO COME

New Zealand Listener, Volume 9, Issue 218, 27 August 1943, Page 2

THINGS TO COME

A Run Through The Programmes

MONDAY "\V ILD Life on Stewart Island" is the subject of two talks to be given from 4YZ by L. E. Richdale (at 7.10 p.m. on Monday, August 30 and Tuesday, August 31), and those who know’ how thorough Mr. Richdale’s studies have been will be anxious to hear him describe some of the fascinating things he has watched and photographed. When we point out that he made 750 visits to the penguin colonies in five years, and has spent £30 on the cost of leg-rings alone, readers will realise that this ornithologist has made a full-time job of his spare time. From papers he has delivered to the Royal Society on the penguins of

Stewart Island, and the albatrosses on Otago Peninsula, it is plain that he deals with subjects of great fascination. The Monday evening talk will be about a trip to Port Pegasus, and Tuesday’s will deal with a visit to Crooked Reach. Also worth notice: 2YA, 8.23 p.m.: NBS String Quartet. 3YA, 9.25 p.m.: Haydn Trio, No, 3 (Studio). 4YA, 8.34 p.m.: Mary Pratt (contralto).

TUESDAY HEN 2YA broadcasts a symphonic synthesis from Boris Godounov at 9.40 p.m. on Tuesday, August 31, there will be at least one interested listener -she of whom it is written A Highbrow Musical Lady Gave a Highbrow Musical Tea; What’s Godounov for them, she said, Is good enough for me. Indeed there is no reason to suppose that the party ever stopped, and for all we. know they will all] be listening. In which case they may also hear Ronald and Zillah Castle playing, earlier in the evening, some 18th century music which may or may not be good enough. For instance, is Daniel Purcell (who, after all, was only the brother of the rea/ Purcell), good enough for a Highbrow MusicalsLady? And Prospero Castrucci, even if he was the model for Hogarth’s "Entaged Musician," is he really good. enough for one who is bound to know already that Signor Prospero was only the brother of the truly notable Pietro, he who led Handel’s orchestra? Or will she turn to this page in search of what is Also worth notice: AYX, 8.0 p.m.: "Hamlet" Overture (Tchaikovki ). 3YL, 8.42 p.m. "Hammerklavier" Sonata (Beethoven). 4YZ, 7.10 p.m: "Wild Life at Stewart Island’ (2). s WEDNESDAY E day in New York a féw years ago a young composer called Anton Rolland played a new piano composition

to his friend, Harry Aronson. Rolland hed named his composition simply "Etude." But Harry Aronson greeted it with applause: "It’s diabolical and it’s good," he said. So the name was changed to "Etude diabolique," and both Rolland and Aronson played the work in broadcast recitals in New York. Now Harry Aronson, U.S. Army, will include it in a studio recital from 1YA on Wednesday, September 1, at 7.30 p.m. The work is written in two keys, accounting for the "devilish" harmonic quality; also, Aronson says, it is devilishly hard to play. The composer, Anton Rolland, who has also served with the U.S. Army, has written a quantity of ballet music, songs and piano works; some of his music has been broadcast, but so far none has been published. Also worth notice: 2YC, 8.44 p.m.: Francesa da Rimini (Tchai-. kovski). 3YA, 8.8 p.m.: Readings: Trimalchio’s Dinner (Petronius). 4YO, 8.0 p.m.: Clarinet Concerto (Mozart),

THURSDAY "COFFEE, please," is of course what the Americans ask for when they are asked what they will drink. Some of them may express a certain astonishment, if not disappointment wherr they are presented with a pale-beige-coloured drink consisting mainly. of milk. For though the Americans drink milk and plenty of it they like it neat-and they also like their coffee neat. We, who also relish coffee, would like to think that coffee is as easy to make as tea. But alas! expert coffee-tasters are shocked at the mere suggestion. Some like a dash of mustard in it and some a pinch of salt. One American housewife

assured us that coffee to be coffee must be "cleared" with an egg white (perish the thought!); Arabs add herbs, and Turks add powdered sugar; Frenchmen add chicory and Germans sawdust; and Karitane nurses are said to make the whole brew from toasted bran or something similar, All of which goes to show that coffee-making is a highly developed art and you might do well to hear more about it by listening to 1YA on Thursday, September 2, at 11 a.m. Also worth notice: 1YX, 8.0 p.m.: Suite No. 2 in B Minor (Bach). 2YN, 8.0 p.m.: Grosse Fugue (Beethoven). AYA, 8.22 p.im.: Fantasia on Beethoven’s "Ruins of Athens" (Liszt).

FRIDAY ING CANUTE demonstrated to his flattering courtiers that it was vain for him to command the waves to stop; and Mrs. Partington, of Sidmouth, forgetting Canute’s object lesson, is said to have seized a mop and attempted to hold back the Atlantic. when a storm flooded her town. Perhaps it was the moral of these tales-the moral so far as the Axis is concerned, of course — that inspired the title of the programme with which National stations will mark the end of the fourth year of war, at 8 p.m. on Friday, September 3: "The Flowing Tide." Within the narrow space of half an hour the NBS will trace the course of events since September, 12 months ago, when we anxiously watched the German advance on Stalingrad, Rommel’s successes in Egypt, and the Japanese ventures in New Guinea. The programme may hark back to some frecording taken of a significant broadcast -perhaps a speech by Mr. Churchill, and there will be a short first-hand account of North African events by a New Zealander home on furlough. Also worth notice: 2YC, 9.0 p.m.: Viola Sonata (Bach) 3YL, 8.0 p.m.: Army Education Welfare Service Concert. 4YA, 9.31 p.m.: "Spring Poems" (readings), SATURDAY "DEATH in the hand’-what might this mean? We know it is the title of a thriller by Max Beerbohm recorded by the BBC and scheduled for broadcast by 2YA at 8.4 p.m. on Saturday, September 4, but that doesn’t settle whether the hand holds a dagger, a revolver, or the fatal phial. So we have done with the recordings what we are always tempted to do with the pages of a mystery thriller, and we are therefore in a position to tell readers that it’s something to do with palms-a palm mystery, in fact. And we know that Esmé Percy makes a very good fist of the leading role. We could even give the show away by naming the sailors’ story by Robert Louis Stevenson which has a similar moral, but we know you would rather tune in and find out for yourself what it’s all about. From other stations: 1YA, 8.0 p.m.: Lyric Harmonists Choir, 3YL, 8.0 p.m.; Music by Elgar. 4YA, 8.0 p.m.; Competitions Prizewinners. SUNDAY HO was the,"Dark Lady of the Sonnets?" Mary Fitton? Lucy Negro? Or some other? We know that her eyes were "raven black" and "nothing like the sun"; that "if hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head" and that "in some perfumes is there more delight, Than in the breath that from my Mistress reeks." As for her voice, though Shakespeare loved "to hear her speak, yet I well know, That Music hath a far more pleasing sound." Unmerciful researchers have spent the intervening centuries attempting to identify these uncomplimentary epithets with their original model, but this was not G. B. Shaw’s object when he wrote his play The Dark Lady of the Sonnets (to be heard from 1YA at 9.33 p.m. on Sunday, September 5). The problems Shaw raises over The Bard are invariably more subtle, and his conclusions of more value. From other stations: 2YA, 2.0 p.m.: "Unfinished" Symphony (Schubert), 3YA, 9.22 p.n.: From Meyerbeer’s Operas. 4YA, 8.0 p.m.: "The Faithful Shepherd" (Handel).