Nobody Ever Gave Bassoon Its Chance

Radio Record, 9 December 1938, Page 13

Nobody Ever Gave Bassoon Its Chance

Low Origins Of An Instrument

SOMETIMES the bassoon is called the low comedian of the orchestra, which is not altogether fair. Our modern bassoon, which makes such a serviceable bass to the oboe family, can claim a very ancient, if odd, origin; for it is actually a descendant of the bass shawm. This frightful arrangement, as Used about the year 1600, was a straight tube of over six feet in length, and raucous beyond al! belief. Later forerunners of the bassoon were the curtal or Dulcian, to say nothing of the Sau-sage-Bassoon which was also Known with excellent reason, as the Racket, These grotesque devices were not only dreadful to hear, judged modern standards, but very awkward to manage, and constant attempts were being made to reduce the instruments to handier

\ proportions. ‘Today, as everyone knows, the bassoon is quite respectable in shape, being doubled back on itself to form.a length of ‘about four feet, and played, like its ancestors, with a double reed. We are reminded by Robert Hull

that all might have gone well with the bassoon had not composers discovered that it could make noises of a most comical description. True, several of the great masters gave the instrument a chance, but what are we to make of Dr. Pepusch and the dirty trick he served the bassoon? That learned pedant of the 18th century wrote a concerto for six bassoons and fiute "in which the bassoons represent six grunting pigs and the flute a sucking-pig." At least one modern composer, William Yeates Hurlstone, treated the instrument with more respect than did Dr.’ Pepusch. Hurlstone wrote 2 "Sonata in F Major for Piano and Bassoon," and this is but one of the several fine chamber works composed by a promising young man who died in 1906 at the age of thirty, before his unusual talent could reach fruition. Hurlsione was one of those strange people who seem to arrive in this world already equipped with a knowledge of musical technique. He had very little early instruction, yet at the age of nine he had published a set of five waltzes for the pianoforte. Pa He studied with the idea of "becoming a professional pianist, but ill-health compelled him to devote himself to composition. ' He wrote three pieces which contain work for the bassoon, and the "Sonata in F Major" with its four short, nicely contrasted movements, is well devised to give the bassoonist opportunities for showing his own and his instrument’s artistic capacity. , 2YA listeners will hear Madame de Mauny (piano) and W. Dearden-Jackson (bassoon) in Hurlfstone’s "Sonata in F Major" on Monday, December 12,

Lady Trumpeter To The Children AT a special link-up of the four main national sta- | tions, famous American lady _ trumpeter, Grace Adams East, | plays and talks to New Zealand children on December 12 at 5.45 p.m. She will talk of her own experiences with the trumpet from = childhood, illustrating the physical and mental benefits to children of some form of music. Talk is cleverly designed to link up her speaking with her playing.