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MUSICAL COURIER
RuthUoydKinney
Contralto
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kind of Beethoven spirit that the audience liked, to judge by the warmth of the favor with which the performance met. Tschaikowsky’s “Francesca da Rimini” had a spirited' and technically brilliant hearing. The “Andante Canta-bile” and “1812” were the closing numbers. The orchestra was in its best form. At the end of the program the Stransky honors took on the aspect of an ovation, obli-gatoed with flowers, and his good bye bows had to be kept up for a considerable time, even after he had made a gracious speech.
Charles Troxell Features Chappell-Harms Songs
At the first concert of the season given by the Caldwell Choral Society under the direction of Irvin T. Francis, Charles Troxell, tenor, was the soloist. His second group of songs was made up of “Thank God for a Garden” (Teresa Del Riego) ; “There is No Death,” the well known song by Geoffrey O’Hara, and the “Blind Ploughman,” by R. Coningsby Clarke, all three numbers belonging to the standard catalogue of Chappell-Harms, Inc. Mr. Troxell sent the following letter to the above mentioned publishers following the concert: “Here is a program where I sang some of your publications. I also teach. ‘Thank God for a Garden, “is surely a beautiful, as well as useful, song.”
Josef and Rosina Lhevinne in Joint Recital
Josef Lhevinne will be heard in recital in Brooklyn February 6, and two days later will give a joint recital with Rosina Lhevinne at Troy, N. Y.
Walter Anderson Moves Offices
Walter Anderson has moved his offices to suite 713-14, at 1452 Broadway, the Calvert Building, 41st street and Broadway.
Odituarx
Carlo Enciso
Carlo Enciso, the young Mexican tenor who made his debut at a Riesenfeld theater last May, died of pneumonia on January 25 at his home, 334 West 46th Street.
Mr. Enciso^ was ill for only a short time. He was born in Mexico City twenty-four years ago and at the age of nineteen had already won for himself considerable reputation as a young singer of promise. A big future seemed to be ahead of him when he came to New York about a year ago to continue his vocal studies. Hugo Riesenfeld, director of the Rivoli, Rialto and Criterion theaters, heard him sing and was sufficiently impressed with the fresh quality of his voice and his natural ability to give him a three years’ contract. The body will be sent home to Mexico City to his relatives there.
Max Knitel-Treumann
At a recent meeting of the New York Singing Teachers’ Association, a resolution of regret was passed at the death of one of its . charter members, Max Knitel-Treumann, who died quietly and suddenly of heart failure at his home on December 28.
A graduate of the Munich Conservatory, he was awarded the “Konigswarter Ehrenpreis,” which had not been won in five years. In 1880, at the urgent solicitation of Theodore Thomas, he gave up a contract for that year and came to America. Here he sang with great success under Theodore Thomas, Seidel, Damrosch, Van Der Stucken. After several years of public singing, he devoted himself entirely to teaching and was thus actively occupied up to the day of his death.
was originally written for strings. It is in three movements. Mr. Siloti’s transcription for strings and woodwind is ingeniously worked out. It is true music and worthy, of repetition.
Lucien Schmit, first cellist of the New York Symphony Orchestra, played with authority Saint-Saëns concerto in A minor. The orchestral accompaniment given him was not all that could be desired, as Mr. Coates often lagged behind. But despite these shortcomings Mr. Schmit gave an excellent demonstration of his facile technic, sweet and singing tone, as well as musicianship.
The closing number—symphonic fantasy, “Francesca di Rimini,” by Tschaikowsky—was presented in a cold, indifferent manner. Power, power and still more power predominated in Mr. Coates’ reading, tonal gradation being entirely absent.
Germaine Schnitzer
Mme. Germaine Schnitzer has created for herself a regular following in New York, and when she played at Town Hall on Sunday afternoon, January 29, there was a large audience to hear her. The principal items of her program were a sonata by Paradies, Beethoven’s sonata (op. 110), the Schumann symphonic studies, a Chopin group, and works by Chabrier, Massenet and Saint-Saëns. That Mme. Schnitzer has command of a wide range of styles was shown at the every beginning in her interpretations of the two sonatas which differ so markedly from each other. Her playing of the Schumann studies was truly impressive, and in the Mozart number there was real charm and delicacy. Chopin has always been one of Mme. Schnitzer’s friends among the composers and her sympathetic delineation of the French numbers of the final group recalled the fact that Mme. Schnitzer is a Parisian and studied under Paris masters. In particular the Saint-Saëns toccata was a masterpiece of bravura. Applause there was a-plenty, calling for numerous extra numbers.
Raisa, Rimini and the Cleveland Orchestra
Rosa Raisa and her husband, Giacomo Rimini, two Chicago favorites, appeared at the Hippodrome on Sunday evening, January 29, sharing the program with the Cleveland Symphony Orchestra which was ably directed by its assistant conductor, Arthur Shepard. Mme. Raisa, looking very fit in a cream colored gown and a small hat with paradise feathers, sang that most difficult of arias, “Casta Diva,” and did it exceedingly well. She has one of the largest and purest dramatic soprano voices in existence today, and this season, at last conscious of its power, sings without the forcing which has sometimes detracted from her work in previous years. In response to the tremendous wave of applause, she sang “Vissi D’Arte” for an encore and later a group of Russian and German songs with piano, adding “Eli, Eli” as an extra number, which brought down the house. Giacomo Rimini sang the “Toreador” song from “Carmen” for his first number with orchestra, adding two extra numbers with piano in response to the applause, and giving in the latter half of the program an Italian group including numbers by Mascagni, Buzzi-Peccia and Tosti, as well as several encores.
The Cleveland Orchestra played the Sibelius “Finlandia,” the final movement from the fourth Tschaikowsky symphony, and the “Rakoczy March,” three noisy and spirited pieces, in a noisy and spirited manner, much to the approval of the audience. An added number was the “Meditation” from “Thais,” the solo of which was played with exquisite tone by the concertmaster.
New York Philharmonic Orchestra
Carnegie Hall, on a Sunday afternoon when the Philharmonic Society plays there, is as full of music enthusiasts as the large edifice possibly can hold. Last Sunday was no exception to the rule, and the sight must have gladdened Conductor Stransky’s heart, for these days mark his final period here this season before his departure for baton activity abroad as a guest with various European orchestras. The “Eroica” symphony was read with the
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were two Schubert-Liszt arrangements—“Sei mir gegruesst” and “Das_ Wandern”—and a set of Chopin favorites, terminating in a splendid interpretation of the scherzo in C sharp minor, played with poetic charm, warmth and fullness of color, and unsurpassed phrasing. It was such a reading as would have delighted the creator of this great Work,
Let Us Americans be thankful that there is one great artist who is not deaf to the importance of MacDowell and who can find time and space on her programs for a Work^ of this great American! She played his “Sonata Tragica,” and read into it all of the tragic intensity by which it was inspired, giving its rendition a splendid tonal balance, crispness of rhythm and commendable taste and finish. Finally there were four studies by Busoni on American Indian melodies and a Liszt rhapsody.
Miss Cottlow was tendered an enthusiastic reception and played several encores.
JANUARY 28
John Powell and the Duo-Art Piano
Those who attended the lecture-recital of John Powell at Ae&lian Hall on Saturday evening, January 28, where he appeared in conjunction with the Duo-Art piano, heard the American composer in a new role and in one for which he soon proved his competency. This wag not surprising, as his compositions are among the most characteristic of modern American music, in at least one field of which— the tiegro influence—he is recognized as a specialist and an authority.
Mr, Powell divided his subject, “Americanism in Music,” into six sections—Indian, negro, Stephen Foster, popular Or ragtime, ultra-ffiodern and Anglo-Saxon folk music, the last being the most important to his mind. Before considering each of these currents of influence in detail, he sketched in broad outlines the dominant power of nationalism at the present day, due in great part to the World War. Then, in analyzing American nationalism, he pointed out the varying elements of which the American people is composed, and the clashing of later national cultures with the original Anglo-Saxon heritage.
The composer was particularly interesting in his treatment of the negro influence. Southern by birth, he has been able to clear up the origin of much of the music usually attributed to that race, including the Stephen Foster melodies which, he said, are not of negro origin but closely akin to German folk music, and the so-called negro spirituals, usually old hymn tunes modified and distorted by characteristic negro rhythms. True negro music, he stated, is rarely heard by the white man and differs widely from that usually classified as such. His treatment of the Stephen Foster influence, especially as it affected Dvorak— the largo of the “New World” symphony is a variation of “Oh Susanna” and the popular “Humoresque” of the “Suwanee River,” paid full tribute to the manner in which Foster has affected American music since his time, not only through the universal popularity of his songs but also through his influence on the composers who have followed him.
Mr. Powell is no modernist in the ultra sense of that term. In fact he considers the influence exercised on the American composer by that school a detrimental one. The attempt to create a new musical idiom he thinks analogous to the constant attempts to create new spoken languages which carry within them the inherent seeds of failure. But neither is he a dogmatist on this subject, as was shown in his discussion of Griffes’ “White Peacock,” when he pointed out that the use of modern dissonances in this composition was largely decorative, giving almost the effect of super-harmonies, its organic and structural form remaining within natural musical evolution. His attack was reserved largely for the work of the extremists.
In Anglo-Saxon folk music Mr. Powell sees the dominant influence in the future of American national composition. Recognition of this important contribution, he said, began only a comparatively few years ago. The influence which this mass of collective music has already exercised and the growth in its appreciation have been constant since that time. In the musical illustrations of this section of his lecture he included Grainger’s “Mock Morris,” two movements from his own suite, “At the Fair,” and one from “In the South,” and Guion’s well known setting of “Turkey in the Straw.”
During the evening the Duo-Art piano gave a convincing exhibition of its capabilities for use in musical education work. With but few exceptions, the illustrations under each group were reproduced by this instrument, the pianists whose recordings were played including Percy Grainger, Harold Henry, Arthur Friedheim, Mr. Powell himself, Charles Wakefield Cadman, Rudolph Ganz, Lester Donohue, Prokofieff, and Griffes, whose recording of his own “White Peacock” was made only a short time before his death. Mr. Powell in person played his own “Elegie Negre,” “Poeme Erotique,” the “Banjo Picker” from his suite “At the Fair,” and, alternating with the Duo-Art, the “Pioneer Dance,” from his suite “In the South.” He was also compelled to give several encores at the conclusion of the program.
JANUARY 29
New York Symphony Orchestra: Lucien Schmit, Soloist
Goossens “Four Concerts” was the novelty brought out by the New York Symphony orchestra under Albert Coates on Sunday afternoon, January 29, in Aeolian Hall, the titles being “The Gargoyle,” “Dance Memories,” “A Walking tune” and “The Marionette Show.” Since coming to America, Mr. Coates has plainly shown his preference towards featuring works by English composers. While one would not wish to advise the guest conductor what, or what not to do, it appears that he is somewhat overtaxing the patience of his audiences here.
The Goossens number, or numbers programmed as ‘Conceits,” might just as well be called “eccentricities,” or even “nightmares.” They are absolutely devoid of melodic content. Laughter among the audience and members of the orchestra was heard after each number.
The concert opened with a clever arrangement by Alexander Siloti of the Vivaldi concerto. This concerto grosso