THINGS TO COME

New Zealand Listener, Volume 10, Issue 242, 11 February 1944, Page 2

THINGS TO COME

A Run Through The Programmes

MONDAY STATION 3YL will not be offended we are sure, and will not think we are trying to accuse it of plagiarism if we point out that a new feature that appears in its evening programmes as from next week is a leaf out of the BBC’s book. It consists of three halfhour sessions a week, all devoted to the music of one composer. Thus, by tuning-in to 3YL at 10.0 p.m. on Monday, Wednesday, or Thursday, next week (February 14, 16, or 17), you may hear music by Tchaikovski. The BBC has tried this with success in the last year, the only difference being that you get your Tchaikovski or your Grieg or your Mozart whichever "This Week’s Composer" happens to be, with your breakfast instead of your nightcap. Also worth notice: 2YA, 9.40 p.m.: "Gracie in the Theatre." 4YA, 7.48 p.m,: "Roof Over London’ (BBC production). TUESDAY T eleven on Tuesday morning, Rewa Glenn will tell 2YA listeners-and that could and we hope will, be the whole Dominion-where bracken stands in the Dominion’s history. No, we do mot mean Bracken the poet, whose place has been fixed, but bracken the fern, which can’t be fixed, but comes to life again, like Pat Malone’s corpse, the moment you turn your back on it, ‘How much bracken has cost New Zealand already no one could estimate, but the classical account of the white man’s war with it is in Guthrie-Smith's Tutira. Rewa Glenn, we feel sure, will refer to that in her broadcast, and she may even bring in H. C. Dobbie’s monumental study of bracken considered botanically. Whatever her approach is, her subject is one of the most terrifying in our brief but by no means peaceful first century. Tune in to 2YA at 11.0 am. on Tuesday, February 15. Also worth notice: 3YA, 11.0 am.: "Herbert Beerbohm Tree" 4x0, 90 p.m.: Quartet in D Flat Major (Dohnanyi). WEDNESDAY Ts world is full of misconceptions. ‘* Some people think that the staff of a broadcasting station consists of two announcers who sit at a microphone and pull out records from a pile as they are needed to make up the programmes. Another idea, equally erroneous, is that which some people have about the way a newspaper office functions. Why, if we tried to live up to the Hollywood conception of journalism (see illustration), The Listener would never go to press; we’d be too busy with the grog bottle, glamour girls, and libel suits. From 3YA on Wednesday, February 16, at 10.47 p.m., listeners will hear a radio version of how an office is run, but whether Harry Tate’s conception is based on actual experience it is impossible to conjecture. One thing is certain; it couldn’t be a picture of The Listener office, for though we may have a few mice, our office boy long ago went to the war. Also worth notice: 1YA, 8.29 p.m.: String Trio in G Major Moeran ( ° 3YA, 8.8 p.m.: Autobiographical passages from John Milton.

T is not a miracle that Professor Allan Nevins continues to be heard from New Zealand stations when he is already weeks away from them, nor a

proof of our own somnolence that we continue to advertise him. The miracle is, of course, just a record, but the explanation of The Listener's continued interest is the importance of the things he is still saying. He came here to tell us about America and to find out what to tell Americans about New Zealand. This he is still doing even when his subject is "The War and the American Farmer." What the war does to American farmers it does indirectly to our own farmers, and it is a privilege to have the facts presented by a man who is s8o little likely to be wrong. The hour, 7.15 p.m. (Thursday, February 17, from 1YA), is a little early for some farmers, but not for the wise ones. Also worth notice: .) 2YC, 8.0 p.m.: Concerto in D Major (Chausson). : 4YA, 8.0 p.m.: "Jubilee" (Chadwick). FRIDAY VARIOUS possibilities sprang to mind when we first noticed the feature to be heard from Station 2YD at 9.16 p.m. on Friday, February 18-‘Con-certo for Crooks." Not Richard, surely? Even for such a capable artist, we thought, a tenor concerto lasting 29 minutes would be a feat of incredible endurance. Or would it be some novel venture in musical form, combining the concerto with the tone-poem.... "The bold safe-cracking motif which opens the first movement contrasts with the lyrical tempo rubato of the second subject .. jemmy bars being a feature of the percussion section in this novel work," etc. etc? Or was it more likely to be connected with the adventures of Lemmy Caution or Mister Callahan? Its author, after all, is Peter Cheyney, who is better known for his detective stories than for any music he may have composed, and so our third guess was probably the right one. E Also worth notice: , | .1YA, 8.0 p.m.: Eighth Symphony (Beethoven). 4YA, 9.52 p.m.: Sonata in D Major (Vinci). SATURDAY PEOPLE who confuse Bellini with Cellini, some one told us the other day, would confuse Machiavelli with Macaroni. No doubt he was right; but he was hard. For although there were three Bellinis and only one Cellini, that

one was half a dozen at least-gold-smith, sculptor, engraver, murderer, swordsman, author, and some things in addition that we don’t nowadays discuss, But you will be clairvoyant if you see the real man through the Berlioz overture "Benvenuto Cellini,’ which you may hear by listening to 3YL on Saturday, February 19. Berlioz, too, was a character, an eccentric genius whom his compatriots did not wish to hear; and if his overture expressed his subject as well as himself, it would be strong meat indeed. Also worth notice: 2YC, 9.0 p.m.: New York Philharmonic Orchestra concert. 4YZ, 9.25 p.m.: Quartet No, 2 in G Major (Beethoven). SUNDAY S we quiver on the brink of meat rationing, 3YA proposes to excite our salivary glands on the evening of Sunday, February 20 with the question "Did Bacon Eat Lamb?" We can answer the question the other way round-that’s easy: Lamb was either a devoted Bacon-Eater or the best advertising copy-writer in history. But we looked up our Bacon and we're not sure. Sometimes we suspect him of epicurean tendencies (c.f., his complaint about ° the women who "laid two or three great strawberries at the mouth of their pot and all the rest were little ones"); and sometimes we find him exhibiting vege- ‘ tarian preferences ("A man’s nature runs either to herbs or weeds"); and suddenly we wonder if he ever ate at all-‘‘Reading maketh a full man." So we have to leave it to H. R. Jeans to tell us the answer-if he knows it. Also worth notice: 1YA, — — NBC Symphony Orchestra programme. ava, 9. ‘0. 22 Fy from Donizetti’s