Books › Musical Courier 1926-02-04: Vol 92 Iss 5, 1926 › scan 44
Scan 44
Musical Courier 1926-02-04: Vol 92 Iss 5, 1926
132 lines. Read by computer on 27 September 2026. Printed page 45. See the scan on archive.org.
A town on its own line is one of the directory's headings. That is where the town on a maker's page comes from.
1February 4, 1926
3ZERFFI
4Teacher of Singing
5STUDIO:
6412 West End Ave., N. Y.
7Trafalgar 4385
9FISHBERG
10VIOLIN INSTRUCTION
11CONCERTS
12RECITALS
13314 West 94th Street, New York. Tel. 2067 Riverside
15LESCHETIZKY
16Master school for pianists and piano students in the musical center of Paris. For terms apply to
17MME. MARIE GABRIELLE LESCHETIZKY
1878 Avenue Malakoff, Paris, France
20SOUSA AND HIS BAND
21JOHN PHILIP SOUSA, Conductor
22Now Booking Season 1925-26
23HARRY ASKIN, Mgr. New York
241451 Broadway
26CHARLES SANFORD SKILTON
27COMPOSER and ORGANIST
28University of Kansas
29Lawrence, Kansas
31J. FRED WOLLE
32ORGANIST
33Management: THE WOLFSOHN MUSICAL BUREAU,
34712-718 Fisk Bldg., New York
36LYMAN ALMY PERKINS
37Voice—Coaching in Church Choir Repertoire
38Conductor "Choir Ensemble Society," Pittsburgh, Pa. and "Valley Choral Club," New Kensington, Pa.
39New Kensington—Mon. and Thurs.—Alter Building.
40Pittsburgh—Tues., Wed., Fri., Sat.—502 Cameo Theater Bldg.
42JOHN F. BYRNE
43TEACHER OF SINGING
44Recommended by Jean de Reszke
45Studio: 187 rue du Fourbourg, St. Honore, Paris
47ANNIE LOUISE (ADAH CAMPBELL)
48DAVID – HUSSEY
49HARP VOICE
50Phones: Riverside 4122 Studios: 294 West 92nd St., N. Y.
52San Francisco Conservatory of Music
53ADA CLEMENT and LILLIAN HODGHEAD
54Co-Directors
55Special Engagement of ERNEST BLOCH
563435 SACRAMENTO STREET SAN FRANCISCO
58MACBETH
59Chicago Civic Opera Company
60LEADING COLORATURA SOPRANO
61JOHN McCORMACK
62EDWIN SCHNEIDER, Accompanist
63Direction D. F. McSweeney
64565 Fifth Avenue New York
65Steinway Piano Used
67CLEMENTINE DE VERE
68Prima Donna
69Soprano
70From Covent Garden, London, Metropolitan Opera, New York, etc. Available for Opera, Concert and Oratorio.
71Also VOCAL TUITION
72Address 109 Riverside Drive, N. Y. City
74ROMUALDO SAPIO
75Vocal Teacher
76Formerly conductor Metropolitan Opera, New York, and European theaters. Coach to Mme. Adelina Patti, Calvé, Nordica and other celebrities.
77Phone Endicott 8066
79Bassi & Cannonieri
80General operatic and theatrical bureau
81(Ufficio di Affari Teatrali)
82Via Durini N. 31, Milan, Italy
83Telephone 10-345
85Brescia for Paris. He gives three reasons for what was then so radical and serious a step. First, to get work and money, second, important persons in Paris, among them Catherine di Medici, urged that his genius should be there transferred and money was promised, third, his creditors were annoying him beyond endurance and he must have money. At this juncture, undoubtedly he would have gone to Paris, and his genius have been lost to Italy, had not a friendly priest, Brother Gabriele of St. Peter's, loaned him 60 pounds. This loan was made with the strictest stipulation that he remain in Brescia. Then came an order for a violin at 3,000 ducats from Cardinal Aldobrandini, a noble patron of the fine arts in Rome, the violin which today is in the possession of an American amateur. Famous as are the necks of Gasparo's violins for distinctive shape, and in some instances even for grotesqueness, this most renowned instrument is a curiosity. Its head, carved by Benvenuto Cellini, represents an angel's face, carved and colored, surrounded by flowing locks of hair. Behind this leans a little mermaid, the form terminating in scales of green and gold, while the tailpiece of the instrument is another mermaid in bronze color. The finger board is ornamented in blue and gold, the bridge delicately carved in the form of two intertwining fish, the zodiacal sign for the month of February. This unique violin was presented by Cardinal Aldobrandini to his native city of Imnsbruck. In 1809, when that city was occupied by the French, the violin was carried to Vienna and sold to a wealthy collector. In 1841 the heirs of this collector disposed of it to Ole Bull, and after the death of this great Swedish virtuoso it passed eventually into the hands of an American.
87HE FINALLY PROSPERS
89Other archives in the City Hall of Brescia show that at one time Gasparo became prosperous enough to pay twenty pounds a year rental for a house on the street of St. Peter the Martyr, a home which he subsequently bought. I saw this house in the very heart of Brescia. The street is small and narrow, so narrow that I could not snap a picture of the three-storied brown stone dwelling. It sways a little forward from its neighbors, and is still handsome despite its time-worn, weather-beaten facade. It is not unusual in Italy that centuries and more shall pass over a house and leave it still relatively fine and fit. There they have no radical climatic changes such as we know in rugged America, no ice storms and sudden frosts to disturb the serenity of Brescia. If they did, many and many a relic of antiquity, like the home of Gasparo on the Street of St. Peter the Martyr, would not only sway forward quite out of plumb, but surely fall into crumbling ruin. Here was the home where Gasparo, most famous of famous lute-makers, grew rich in his old age and passed his last ten years of life; and here, April 14, 1609, he died. Records show that at the time of his death his stock of violins, finished and unfinished, were appraised at 200 pounds. His son, Francesco, carried on the business marking his own violins "Francesco, son of Gasparo, in Brescia." But he had, it seems little if any success. Within five years he and the business disappeared into parts unknown.
91MANY SHOPS THERE STILL
93No sign of life was visible in the old home of Gasparo as I passed out from the quiet street and on into a back alley where were many small instrument repairing and manufacturing shops, looking as though they had not changed their character or appearances since Gasparo fashioned his violins in his workshop and dwelling around the corner. A maker's shop door stood open. It was the noon hour and numerous young boys employed in the one roomed shop were dashing out into the sunshine, free for their two-hour lunch and siesta. Various stringed instruments, violins, guitars, violas, cellos, etc., lay about on the ground before the shop entrance. When it was seen that I was preparing to take a photograph of the place, several of the boys ran back to be in the picture, youngsters like Gasparo when first he evolved the instrument he called the violino.
95A DUCAL DECREE
97In 1628, nineteen years after Gasparo's death a ducal decree in Brescia declared that this instrument alone was to be called the "violino," and all honor was to be given incontestably to the family Bertolotti, now calling themselves Salo, since it was the custom in those days for a master in any of the arts to call himself and his family, if he desired, after his native city. The ducal decree reads in part:
99The first Idea,
100The first Conception,
101The first Execution,
102Is to be to the glory of Gaspar.
104Brescia had honored Gasparo at his death by interment in the Church of St. Joseph, and toward this ancient consecrated edifice I wound my way. Past the modern parts of the city, with its tramways and automobiles, my search led me until, buried in the deepest heart of antiquity amidst tortuous streets, where not even a bicycle might penetrate, I found myself in the Brescia of mediaeval days. Out of the maze of small shops, through the outdoor market with its venerable, ever-flowing fountain, I came to the street, Via Gasparo da Salo. So read a new blue and white sign. I followed along the narrow length. Ahead there appeared a high, grayish stone wall. Nothing broke its tall severity save only a sculptured marble group, a base relief of a violin with broken strings. A tablet beneath read:
106Gasparo da Salo
107In the Art of the Lute a Master,
108And on the Violin, His new creation.
109Born in Salo 1542
110Died in Brescia 1609.
111Buried in this church.
113To find the obscure entrance to the church, of which this high, forbidding wall was one side, it was necessary to go around the corner, down a short flight of time-worn stone steps, and across a small, stone piazza, into which opened the arched entrance of the arcaded, walled-in churchyard garden. All within the garden was going to luxurious waste. The flagging of the cloistered walks was sunken or raised as the earth beneath had risen or sunk. The vines and flower beds were a riot of disorder, and morning glories wound about the trunks of aged tall palm trees giving a glow of delicate uncultivated color. The corridors leading into the ancient church were deadly cold. Faded frescoes and broken sculptures told a history of grandeur fallen to poverty, for the parish of St. Joseph is now poor and stricken, the once magnificent church neglected. From the altar door where I had entered, a brown-robed priest,
115(Continued on page 48)
117SOHMER
119IN the making of the Sohmer Piano there is no thought of quantity—no consideration of numbers. Each instrument is an entity in itself—an individual unit, as carefully wrought, as deftly constructed, and containing the same measure of imagination and idealism as any other masterpiece of art.
121The completed instrument transcends the material elements of which it is made. It is its spirituelle qualities—the unforgettable richness of its tone, that brings with ownership the all-satisfying realization that one has the best.
123"SOHMER" on a piano conveys a definite guarantee of superlative quality—the family name of individuals who actively build, own, and control the piano which bears their name, carrying out the traditions and experience of more than fifty years in the building of fine Pianos.
125Sohmer Pianos are made in various styles and sizes of Grands, Uprights, Players, and Reproducing Players, all of one quality. Uprights from $700 and upward. Grands $1250 and upward. Period models in Queen Anne, Italian Renaissance, Louis XVI, Spanish Renaissance and Jacobean. Monthly terms of payment if desired. Illustrated Catalog mailed on request.
127SOHMER & CO.
128Established 1872
12931 WEST 57TH ST.
130NEW YORK
131Factory Astoria, L. I.
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