PERSONALITIES ON THE AIR

Radio Record, 8 July 1938, Page 16

PERSONALITIES ON THE AIR

‘Fp EHIND the intriguing and . Bq charming art of Terence Casey’s cinema-organ playing is.a sound training on classical lines. He belonged originally to the London Academy: of Music, and. fully intended following the profession of an operatic conductor. After some years of organ playing in chutches, Mr. Casey took up cinema-organ work in 1914. He. went to America after the war, and © returned home to play at the Regent . Theatre, Brighton, where he remained for ten years. He has worked in provincial cinemas for sixteen years, and is at present organist at the Gaumont Palace, Chelsea. Terence Casey’s delightful gramophone recordings are most popular. . A sample will be heard in 4¥A’s Dinner Music session on Wednesday, July

HUSBAND IS HER STERN®ST CRITIC.

Born in the lovely Lake District of Fingland, Muriel Brunskill spent all

her girlhood in Westmoreland, but when it was discovered that she had a phenonenal voice she went to London. ‘to study with Madame Blanche Marchesi, whose mother, Mathilde Marchesi, was the teacher of Melba. Later she gpenr a considerable time in Germany specialising in lieder. For the past dozen years or so she has divided her career among-all branches of sing: ing..for she is équally noted as a festival singer, a Soloist with great orches‘ras; a lieder artist, a concert singer and’an opera star. In private life Madame Brunskil] is Mrs. Robert Ainsworth, and she stresses the fact that she owes her musicianship to her husband (ene of the Covent Garden conductors), who is her sternest critic. Listeners to 3YA will hear Muriel Pranekit, contralto, on Friday, June

TAUBER COMPOS-~ ED OPERA DUPING ILLNESS.

While still in his teens, Richard Tauher trained as Q conductor at the Frank

furt Conservatorium, and during an illnes." composed his finest opera. At Freiburg, when he was nine'een, Professor Karl Beins discovered his gold en voice. Tn 1918, he made his debut as Tamino in "The Magie Flute." ane was immediately engaged for the Dres: den State Opera, where he ‘remained for 10 years In 1915, he sang for the first time in Berlin, as "Bacchus" in the Richard Stranss opera "Ariadne." He was the first German singer to ap-. pear before the war in Stockholm and

with the Opera in Paris. To. this out standing exponent of Lehar’s works the composer dedicated "You Are M) Heart’s Delight." Listeners to 1YA wil] hear ®'chard Tauber, tenor, on Wednesday, July 13.

PIANQ PROPped UP BY BEER BARREL.

One of those English artists whose fine gifts are happily available on the

records, Kathleen Long was only thirteen when she won an open scholarship at the Royal College, going from Bury St. Edmunds, to study in London. She is now Professor at the college, as well as a concert pianist of distinction. Mozart is the composer whose music she delights in playing most, but she has a fine understanding of many other Schools of music, notably Debussy’s and Revel’s. She is a fine ensemble player, too, especially in chamber music. She has had her share of odd accidents which befall the touring artist, and recalls among them one oceasion when a mishap deprived the pianoforte of one of its legs. A beer-barrel had to do duty for it at the concert! Kathleen Long, pianist, will be heard from 4Y¥A on Sunday afternoon, July

ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF MENDELSSOHN.

Mendelssohn differed from the other great masters of mnuesie hv

the astonishing multiplicity of his accomplishments. Rarely have so many worthwhile qualities been united in one man, for, besides being a great composer, he was an admirable pianist, a fine organist, a wonderful extemporiser and conductor, a varied linguist and could use both brush and pencil with skill and grace. He visited England many times, and it was upon the occasion of his second visit in 1832, when he was 23 years of age, that the "Capriccio Brilliante’ was eomposed and performed. Mendelssohn was staying at the house of Thomas Attwood, Upper Norfolk, where. he enjoyed the lovely English spring, the scent of the lilacs, and practised his gymnastics in the garden while he was working on the "Capriccio." It was performed in London for the first time, at Mori’s concert, on May 25, 1832, with the eomposer at the pianoforte. It is a typical Mendelssohn work, light and mercurial in| character, yet requiring consummate: artistry and fluent technique, It is a coincidence that the birthday of Gil Dech is the same as that of the great master whose work he will play ~February 38. "Canriceiy" will he rlayed from 8YA‘ . m June 17 by piano and orchestra, with Gil Dech at the pianoforte.

WHAT ELSE COULD BE EXPECTED?

Tn bis book; "Char- Ies Reade As I F,aw Fim 2} Johu Cole "an r`0a 'Ig 22

‘nterestinge fact xnbor "The Clojster and the Hearth" «howing how it was neriv strangled at birth. When originally brough! out -in 1851 under the nome of "A Good Fight" in "Once a Week," its publication was

} Partner To Patti | When Eleven

A LIVING link with the great ° figures of nineteenth century European music, Bronislaw Huberman has spread the joy of his glorious violin playing the world over by means of his gramophone recordings. This Warsaw-bora genius was playing concertos at seven, and three years later was a pupil under Joachim himself. Adelina Patti heard him play in London when he was eleven and engaged him as supporting artist for her European tour. He appeared at her farewell concert and was a sensation, numbering among his admirers the composer Brahms, who normally loathed infant ‘musical prodigies, Lately Huberman has taken a leading part in the founding of a symphony orchestra in Palestine, vhich had the honour of being con‘ucted by Toscanini. , Listeners to 2YA will hear Bronislaw uberman, violinist, on Thursday, July

suspended in consequence of the editor’s tampering with the "copy," an indignity which the author resented by breaking off further relations, and abruptly and unsatisfactorily winding up the story. Ultimately, however, it s.w the light in a complete form under its present well-known title. The editor of the periodical was subsequently confined in a lunatic asylum, whereupon Reade made one of. his characteristic remarks, "Poor fellah!" he said, "Poor fellah! I’m sorry for him, Of course, I’m bound to be sorry for. him as a Christian, but what else could be expected from a fellah who tampered with my copy?" At 4YA on Friday, July 15, Professor T. D. Adams will give readings from Charles Reade’s novel . "The Cloister and the Hearth." ,

CASALS LOSES ALMOST EVERYTHING.

Casals’ Barcelona Orchestra has been the great passion of his life. He has

used his ’cello as the orchestra’s breadwinner and his own. With his own orchestra he works for love, and time counts little, if at all. At Barcelona they go on rehearsing to all hours. of the night (or did) for the fun of the. thing, Casals subsidising the whole undertaking himself. Now, since the catastrophe of 1986. he has lost almost everything. Civil war is no respecter of persons or institutions, and Spain will take many years to settle back to normal whichever side wins. Meanwhile everything and everybody suffers. Pablo Casals, ’cellist, will be heard at 1¥A on Sunday afternoon, July 10.

SOLO PIANIST OF MUCH PROMISE.

Among the younger and more promising Wellington pninnists is

Miss Dorothy Downing, au artist who has to thank her sister for her initial tuition. Miss Downing is an enthusiastic member of the Piano Group of the British Music Society. In various examinations and competitions this pianist has done well, and her recital performances are always interesting

and have won high praise from the critics. With additional experience and close application Miss Downing should become one of our best solo pianists. She will.soon be heard from 2YA.

SMALL BOY WAS UNDER THE DRUM.

British music is 4 passion with Debroy Somers, for he was ‘getually botn while

a British military band was playing a few wards awuy! Its strains were the first he heard. His father was the pandmaster and all Debroy Somers’ early memories sare of music, At three-this was in Egypt by the wayhe spent, as Arthur Sullivan did in his childhood, all his time in the pand room. At four he tried to be a member of the band! When it paraded for a march young Somers was under the « big drum, and was only discovered, and hauled out-the drummer couldn’t

seé him, of course-after the band had gone some distance. Listeners to 3¥YA will hear Debroy Somers Band on Tuesday, July 12.

HE BIRCHED ENGLAND'S ARISTOCRACY.

For a whole quart~ er of: a century, from 1809 to 1834, Eton had as head-

master, the Rey. Dr. John Keate, an expert exponent of "Bible and Birch," who was remarkable for the severity of his discipline. He has come down through history as "the famous flogging headmaster of Eton." Of course, the limbs of England’s family trees got it back on the doctor many a time and oft. One habit which seemed to.afford them unlimited pleasure wag that of pulling Dr. Keate’s bell as often as the vigilance of their superiors would admit, Several tinies the irate pedagogue ran out to catch them, and the- boys, determining to take advantage -of. this, one evening placed a sack of soot on the doorstep, and rang the-bell with vigour; as before; Dr. Keate immediately rushed out, avd, embracing the soft black mass, exclaimed: "Ah,-caught you at last." loa. Bs On Tuesday; July 12, a talk will be heard from 4YA. The subject is "John Keate-The Flogging Headmaster." The speaker will. be.Mr. K. W.-R. Glasgow: 7 Los

HER VOICE STARTLED THE LONDONERS.

The Americun so-, prano, Dusolina Giannini, startled eonservative Lon-

don into placing her with the greatest recent names in song. She was born in Philadelphia, the daughter and pupil of Ferruccio Giannini, a distinguished tenor, who made some records in the very early days of the gramophone. Though, like every perfectly trained singer. she can "sing everything," some of her loveliest achievements have been in the domain of pure lytic song-in simple legato melodies of the type where the utmost correctness of intonation is the very first demand upon the artist. A wonian of gentle and winning personality, of almost Olympian sim-

plicity and dignity of presence, she stepped by natural right into the company of the great, In 2YA’s presentation of Verdi's '"Ajda" .on Sunday, July 10, Dusolina ulatinini sings the fitle role...

Music Of Harsh Realities

THE music to the film, "Things to Come," represents a brave attempt of the new spirit to get to grips with its own problems, and it has a peculiar interest for its contemporaries. . It cannot be doubted, in the cpinion of Mr. Ernest Newman, that music such as this of Arthur Bliss, an ex-guardsman, ‘mirrors the world that is now shaping itself before our troubled eyes-a world of hard realities and primitive atavisms, in which sentiment, as our fathers conceived, has a very small place. Bliss’s film music paints drastically the horrors that astonished and perturbed humanity sees opening out before it, and is of its own epoch. This is curiously shown when, at the end of the film, the composer tries to paint the distant new world that will presumably arise on the ruins of the old. The niusic to H. G. Wells’s film, "Things to Come,’ played by the London Symphony Orchest*a, under the composer, Arthur Bliss, will be heard a 1¥YA on Sunday aftertioon, July