58
DONATO
March 16, 1922
Hale. Miss Bonner left recently for a short tour of the Middle West giving, among others, recitals at Cohan’s Grand Opera House on March 5, and in the Hotel Statler ballroom, Cleveland, Ohio, March 7.
Norfleet Trio Bookings
The Norfleet Trio (consisting of the sister, Helen, pianist; Katherine, violinist, and Leeper Norfleet, cellist) played twice on February 26—in the afternoon for the Civic Ciub, and in the evening at Sada Cowen’s musicale, the last named being the fifteenth appearance in New York this season. Four are booked for April. On February 27 the trio, known as “Crusaders for Chamber Music,” began a five weeks’ tour, playing in the following cities: Orlando, Fla.; Abing-
Mishkin Photo
HELEN NORFLEET.
don, Va.; Fort Worth, Dallas, Austin, Stamford, and Ste-phenville, Tex.; Ardmore, Okla.; Fayetteville University, Ark., and Cairo, 111. The children’s programs especially have caused considerable comment, so that the Junior Club department of the National Federation of Music Clubs is booking the trio through ten states in the autumn. It will probably give a number of such programs in New York, as subscription concerts, during the season 1922-23.
An endorsement of this trio from Louis Svecenski, the well known violinist and teacher, is as follows:
New York, February, 1922.
Being sincerely interested in all efforts toward the furtherance of a knowledge and appreciation of chamber music in this country, it has given me much pleasure to follow the work of the Norfleet Trio, which I consider an ensemble organization of unusual excellence. Thanks to a genuine ensemble_ feeling and an equally genuine .musical warmth which is evident in each player, their performance of the master works of the literature is most gratifying and appealing to the musical listener.
While they have in their repertoire the representative works of the various schools, I was particularly interested to find that the Norfleet Trio has collected splendid material for performances to young listeners—children—who by being introduced in this way to music composed for such combination of instruments will to my mind receive the best possible foundation for the development of a refined musical taste. I feel that the mission of the Norfleet Trio in this direction will prove as valuable and־ important for chamber music as the “Young People’s Concerts” given by the New York Symphony Orchestra tinder Walter and־ Frank Damrosch have been for symphonic music. Everyone recognizes the splendid educational value of those concerts and knows the very great success they have had for many years. I hope that the efforts of the Norfleet Trio will be rewarded by equal success.
(Signed) Louis Svecenski.
Marion Lovell Scores in Providence, R. I.
Marion Lovell has just returned from a very successful appearance in Providence, R. I., where on February 25 she was soloist at the final concert of the Providence Journal-E. F. Albee series, which succession of exceptionally fine musicales has been offered as a means of educating the public to better appreciation of worth-while music. The Providence Journal commented as follows : “Miss Lovell’s singing was a source of keen delight to the capacity audience which thronged the immense Albee Theater, and her songs were well chosen to display flexibility of voice which is of considerable breadth for one of its type, and it has colorín light, rapid runs and other florid use of the voice she is certain and true to pitch. Her extreme upper notes are very pure and are managed with ease. The ‘Swiss Echo Song’ afforded a pleasing number for the exhibition of her vocal control ; the echo effects were admirably done. There fs moreover in her singing an artistic sense and display of musicianship that places her work on a level with that of noted singers in the concert field.”
Beatrice Warden, of Providence, added much to the enjoyment of the program by her artistic accompaniments. On April 21 Miss Lovell will appear in Providence with the Masonic Choir, this concert to be held in the Opera House.
More Mannes Sonata Concerts
David and Clara Mannes will be heard again next season in their sonata recitals, so justly appreciated by the discriminating. For the past few years Mr and Mrs. Mannes have been so occupied with the organization and development of their school that they have practically withdrawn from the concert stage. The school has grown with unprecedented rapidity and is now so well established that its directors are again able to give some time to playing.
Arthur Judson, of Philadelphia, has undertaken the management of their concerts for next season. A limited number of engagements only will be booked. The many friends who know these delightful artists and their work will look forward with pleasure to the privilege of hearing them again.
MUSICAL COURIER
LEO ORNSTEIN INTERVIEWED
(Continued from page 14)
so indispensable as the purity and worth of the stone itself. And Ornstein's own music is full of real substance. No one can become familiar with it and not recognize the force of the subject matter, however much one may object to the harmonic scheme. That, of course, is a matter of debate. But that, too, is as natural and as inspired as the melodies themselves.
There is a very real force in the subject matter of this new sonata for two pianos, and there is no less interest in the cello sonata, which is much more within the reach and comprehension of the average listener who has been brought up on old style, unmodernistic music. This cello sonata contains some of the most beautiful and effective music that Ornstein has composed, at least of that which is familiar to me—but I find the last movement hard to follow. It has a difficult tonal system that is not found in the other movements, and upon examination, aided by the composer, this appeared to be the result of unaccustomed frequency of modulation. One cannot, of course, in matters of art, say “This is right” or “This is wrong.” It is largely a matter of what one is accustomed to, and Ornstein argues that one would soon become accustomed to these modulations with increased familiarity. Perhaps! But I am inclined to think that such modulations, to be desirable, must be contrapuntal rather than harmonic.
In most of Ornstein’s music this is invariably the case. His system of basic harmonies is generally perfectly clear. The dissonances that he uses are alterations of the basic harmonies, and, at times, chords or notes that have no harmonic significance. As he says, they represent only color or rhythm. This is in accord with my own view. In “The Perfect Modernist” I call them “drum” chords.
Also, Ornstein acknowledges the basis of his music to be traditional and racial. I called attention to the fact that the trio in the scherzo of the cello sonata resembled the opening of Tschaikowsky’s “1812” overture, and he immediately grasped the idea and found it perfectly natural. It has its basis in the Russian and the Jewish hymn, and he called attention to the same idiom in Bloch’s “Sholomo.” He lays down his long-stemmed pipe and hops over to the piano, his fingers grasping at the notes almost before he is seated—• and plays some of this composition—the part where the old cynic philosopher grumbles to himself.
One of the most amazing things about Ornstein is his facility and his memory. He is always drifting towards the piano, and almost any piece of music that is mentioned seems familiar to him—so familiar that he can play portions of it. This is true not only of the piano repertory, but also of all sorts of orchestral pieces, of new things like the Griffes sonata, Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Casella, anybody, almost, you may mention. He never hesitates for key nor chord, never fumbles about like some of us would to find the right notes. It would be a tonic and an eye-opener to many a young aspirant to have a talk with Ornstein, with a piano at hand—and it would probably encourage some of them to give up music and look for a job. It would certainly fill them with a hopeless sort of envy, and possibly, if they were young enough, get them down to the sort of hard work that results in results, although it is doubtful if hard work had much to do with Ornstein’s fluency; it is more likely inborn.
One thing which rather surprises the interviewer is Ornstein’s attitude towards Schoenberg. To use a vulgar expression, he cannot “see” Schoenberg. His music appears to him to lack pretty nearly everything that is essential to music. On the other hand, he also comments with decided pointedness upon some of Wagner. “What sort of a melody is this?” he asks with evident scorn, humming the tune of the “Ride of the Valkyries,” but acknowledges in another breath that it is “probably all right for what it was intended, on the stage, but not in concert and certainly not as absolute music.”
Ornstein seems to have had little trouble in finding publishers for his work—a fact that should set some other composers thinking. Whether large or small, his music gets into print, while that of many others remains in manuscript. One reason, no doubt, for this is that this music of Ornstein’s bears so manifestly the mark of the master. There is, in it, no striving with inadequate technical facility, no smallness, no painful and difficult building up of chords and harmonies. However good or bad it may be—and that remains for the future to judge—it is the work of a born master musician.	F. P.
Marcella Craft’s New Programs
Satisfactory from all points of view are the programs which Marcella Craft proposes to sing at her recital next season. Her operatic program includes a number of new arias practically unknown but most suitable for the concert platform, and her song programs will bring much that is new and very beautiful. Such American composers as William Arms Fisher. A. Walter Kramer, Wintter Watts, Harriet Ware, and Emil Polak are represented. These Americans will be associated on these programs with Sibella, Wolf-Ferrari, Zandonai and Guagni. The songs from the pens of these Europeans will be novelties to the American concert goer. In the German group Brahms is prominently in evidence; but Sucher, Boese, Lessmann, Heitsch, lesser known composers, will also be given a hearing.
Marcella Craft has been booked extensively for recitals of her own and for joint appearances with Kathryn Meisle, contralto; Gutia Casitfi, cellist, and Vera Barstow, violinist. The Craft-Meisle-Casini and the Craft-Meisle-Barstow combinations are rapidly increasing in popularity. Their programs are unique and interesting.
Bonner in Recital This Season
Elizabeth Bonner, a young contralto, who previously sang with the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra, is making her first recital appearances this season. She sang recently in B.oston, Mass., at Jordan Hall, scoring a success before a large and enthusiastic audience. “Her voice is of true contralto quality, rich, sometimes sombre; a voice of extended range, best suited to the interpretation of majestic, solemn or intensely passionate music, and not incapable of expressing light and gay sentiments. Her intonation was pure and her enunciation as a rule distinct,” says Philip
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