Books › Musical Courier 1927-11-10: Vol 95 Iss 19, 1927 › scan 29
Scan 29
Musical Courier 1927-11-10: Vol 95 Iss 19, 1927
161 lines. Read by computer on 29 September 2026, twice; the two readings disagreed in places. Printed page 30. See the scan on archive.org.
1to meet me at a recital she gave that night. This Monday Mr. B—, the vocal teacher, has asked me to call to talk over some weighty project. I am also spending some time over this letter of explanation. That is how the time goes. I apparently have nothing to show for it, and I have been occupied all the time."
3This is so nearly a picture of our own troubles, that we thought it might do for a collective alibi.
5* * *
7From the London Daily Telegraph:
9"The London correspondent of the Musical Courier has written: 'The mushy ballad concerts, once so beloved in London, now have fallen into neglect, and soon may be expected to cease altogether. The conventional English vocal balled scances used to be stultifying excrescences on the annual musical season, and did more than any other agency to hinder the general English public from becoming acquainted with the great classical and modern art songs. And this from the home of The Rosary!'"
11Thanks for the compliment, Mr. Legge, but we don't think we wrote it. The sentiments are ours, all right, but somehow we can't remember ourselves saying "stultifying excrescences." Splendid phrase! But the last sentence, added by your illustrious pen, is unkind. Would we resent any little aversion you might have to an American trunk murder because some Englishmen seem to have taken a fancy to cutting up their best girls?
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15"Tyrants" have ever been the greatest promoters of art; and it is not surprising to see Mussolini doing all sorts of things to further the art of music. His latest is the establishment of a "Discoteca," which we may translate to mean a phonographic library, in Rome. Our informant picturesquely tells us that it is for the "registration, conservation and propagation of a determined artistic patrimony"—which is too good to translate.
17* * *
19Stravinsky is in London just now making a set of pianola records of his works with autobiographical footnotes (no pun intended!) concerning himself. Stravinsky enthusiasts will hereafter be able to play Stravinsky's works while they read how, when, where and why he wrote them, which will be very helpful. Especially the last.
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23The great sensation in the Albert Hall, when Chaliapin sang Rimsky-Korsakoff's Mozart and Salieri, was, next to Chaliapin, the echo. There has been a famous echo in the Albert Hall since it was built, in dear old Queen Victoria's day, but many people never discovered it until the other night, when they heard Chaliapin twice on the same evening, and afterwards heard him address them as "La-adie-ies a-and ge-entleme-en!" The manager of the show afterwards claimed to be unaware of the existence of the echo, which is not convincing, since he charged double the usual fee.
25* * *
27From the critic's point of view the Hall is of course, excellent, for even if you do come a little late, you are still in time for the echo. C. S.
29PICKLED MUSIC
31The Cleveland Plain Dealer (October 28) contained an interview with William R. Steinway, London member of the celebrated piano firm.
33Mr. Steinway, noted as a keen critic of musical conditions, and also as a bit of a wag, gave out, among other interesting opinions, these views on current matters:
35Some like their pickles sour and some like them sweet. Some like jazz and some like Mozart. Some even like their pianos just a little out of tune. That's a fact. I know one musician who was billed to give a concert in southern France. There was only one piano in the place and it was badly out of tune. A tuner was sent for, but by the time he arrived, the pianist had fallen in love with the instrument just as it was. He wouldn't have it touched.
37His car had grown used to the dissonance. And that's the way with jazz. First time you hear Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue you think it terrible. You fall in love with it at the third hearing.
39The Steinway philosophies might apply also to symphonic modernistic music, except for the fact that the writer of these editorial lines has listened to Schönberg's works more than thirty-three times, and still thinks most of them terrible.
41ON VOCAL METHODS
43Under the caption "On Vocal Methods" a letter from William A. C. Zerffi was printed in last week's issue of the Musical Courier, being a reply by the distinguished New York voice teacher to an editorial that appeared in our issue of October 27 entitled Different Methods—Same Results.
45In a short editorial paragraph introducing Mr. Zerffi's letter, mention was made that he was a "vocal teacher at the New England Conservatory of Music in a town of no less importance than Boston." As a result of this editorial note some people have wanted to know if Mr. Zerffi had removed to Boston. No. Mr. Zerffi has not removed to Boston. He maintains his New York studio as usual and divides his time between New York and Boston.
47Also, be it added, Mr. Zerffi's letter about vocal methods was not written from Boston but from New York, in the studio where he keeps his scientific apparatus and where he has done most of his investigation of vocal mysteries from the scientific point of view, which has led to the many valuable results which have been described in Mr. Zerffi's many articles in the Musical Courier.
49The first two chapters of Mr. Zerffi's new book, Fact and Folly in the World of Song, which is to be run serially in the Musical Courier, are printed in this issue.
51THE SMOKING SINGERS
53An association ("incorporation now pending") has been formed, with offices at 80 East 11th Street, New York (Henry Bern, president) called The Tobacco Society for Voice Culture. Some of its objects are:
55To improve existing cigarette-advertising so that the same shall be directed toward the health and comfort of the public, particularly in relation to the care, improvement and strengthening of the vocal cords and to stimulate and encourage throat ease by means of campaigns and propaganda to the end that the public will be educated to believe and swallow anything without verification or mastication.
57To offer rewards to those possessing the smoothest and mellowest voices proved to have been cultivated and developed by smooth cigarette and light literature.
59To circulate among the institutions of higher musical learning in the United States and elsewhere information of the new methods of voice culture through cigarette smoking.
61To establish homes and refuges for singers, Senators and sensationalists whose voices have cracked under the weight and strain of their numerous cigarette testimonials.
63Mr. Bern sent to the Musical Courier the prospectus of his organization, and a careful perusal of the document necessarily raises the idea that the president and his associates are somewhat inclined to be jokers.
65At any rate, when the T. S. for V. C. made request recently before a high legal tribunal for a charter and paper of incorporation, their application was refused as being "frivolous."
67The idea of Mr. Bern and his society probably is, to call attention to the wide advertising of certain cigarette firms, which publish testimonials of prominent musicians (especially vocalists) to the effect that they smoke quantities of such brands of cigarettes without injury to their voices.
69Presuming that all the testimonial givers are sincere in their statements, nevertheless the publicity campaign in question lacks something in dignity, viewed from the standpoint of the highest musico-artistic ethics.
71WAS NERO A VIOLINIST?
73In Paris recently, the chairman of the Paris American Club, in introducing the violinist San Malo, made a facetious reference to the supposed fact that Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Mr. San Malo, in responding to the introduction, pointed out that the first mention of the fiddle in history is about 1510, and that therefore the evil emperor could not have been a violinist. So it seems that there was, at any rate, one vice which Nero did not possess. What he probably did play was the liar or the loot.
75History tells us that the forerunner of the violin was an instrument called the crwth, which was indigenous to Wales and England, though it probably originated in India. Its model resembled that of the Greek lyre, but instead of being plucked with the fingers, the strings were sounded by means of a bow. The instrument was mentioned by an Irish poet who flourished before the beginning of the Christian era.
77The names Viol, Violin and Fiddle are derived from the Latin fides, which means string. In various European countries the king of stringed instruments has been known as Fidrula, Viluela, Viula, Vielle, Fitehe, Fidel, Fiedel, and Vedel. The modern name, Violin, is from the Italian, Viola, of which Violino is the diminutive form.
79In the light of the above it will be seen that the term "fiddler" is not one of derision, being based, as it is, on the etymological derivation of the name of the most popular of musical instruments.
81Apropos, it might be mentioned that Mr. San Malo has recently been scoring pronounced successes in Europe and now in America.
83ECLIPSE OF RUBINSTEIN
85What has become of Rubinstein, Anton Rubinstein, lionized during the latter part of the nineteenth century as a great pianist and a composer of commanding talents? He died and that ended his piano playing. But where are his compositions, which at one time sounded in every concert hall and in almost every home?
87His symphonies have disappeared; one or two of his operas and ballets are heard very rarely in Russia; his piano concerto in D minor comes to the surface occasionally at the hands of well known virtuosi, but is fast drifting into the class of compositions reserved for conservatory concerts; the Rubinstein piano solos, barcarolles, variations, dances, and hundreds of other pieces in the small forms, no longer are in the repertory; the songs have dwindled down to the seldom heard Es blinkt der Thau; the choral works are dead; the chamber music is represented only by one trio and one cello sonata, infrequently performed.
89All that remains is the Melody in F, and recently it has suffered the final indignity (or is it a glorification?) of being used as the chorus of a jazz song.
91If Wagner killed all the other modern opera composers, then Brahms can be said to have killed all the other modern writers of symphony and of piano music, and Rubinstein, through the nature of his works, was bound to be one of the first and worst of the sufferers.
93Amy Ellerman has made Christmas records for phonograph companies, including Gesu Bambino, by Yon. Schumann-Heink, Schelling and Mrs. MacDowell will appear in the course of lectures this season at Town Hall, New York.
95Ernest Carter sailed, October 28, for Germany, to attend the premiere of his opera, The White Bird, in Osnabruck. one of two readings
96Ernest Carter sailed, October 28, for Germany, to attend the premiere of his opera, The White Bird, in Osnabrück. one of two readings
98200 guests attended the second Sunday evening musicale of the Grand Opera Society.
100Brooklyn Morning Choral, Herbert S. Sammond, conductor, appeared at St. Andrew's M. E. Church, New York, October 30.
102I SEE THAT
104The Dayton Westminster Choir has begun its sixth annual tour.
106John McCormack refuses to give up his reunion with his family in Ireland for $12,000 offered him for a concert in America.
108Devora Nadworny's engagement at Westchester, Pa., was so enjoyed that she was asked to repeat the same concert at Warren, Pa.
110Mana-Zucca writes of the musical ability of her young son, Marvin.
112Mario Corti has sailed for America to take up activities at the David Mannes School.
114Lucien Muratore will sing at the Opera Comique.
116A Requiem with jazz is the latest composition by the Prague composer, Burian.
118The manuscript of Wagner's Der Tannenbaum has been discovered in Zurich.
120Emanuel Bay, who has been associated with Zimbalist as pianist, has located in New York.
122Opera in German has been tabooed in Alsace.
124Pizzetti and Castelnuovo-Tedesco are collaborating on a concerto for piano and orchestra.
126The Oxford University Press is getting out a new musical magazine to be called the Dominant.
128Wilhelm Bachaus has been invited to head a piano master class in Vienna.
130Pietro Mascagni is the composer of the new Fascisti hymn, The Hymn of Work.
132Donald Francis Tovey, eminent British musician, will return to America in January.
134There will be a benefit performance of Turandot at the Metropolitan on November 18.
136Dr. G. De Koos has arranged for the uniting of European managers abroad thereby assuring more engagements to artists seeking European reputations.
138The twelfth season of the Biltmore Musicales opened auspiciously with the appearance of Lucille Chalfant, Louis Graveure and Mischa Weisbord.
140Buzzi-Peccia gives his impression of singing conditions in Italy on his return to this country.
142Chicago Opera season opened with a brilliant performance of Traviata.
144MUSICAL COURIER READERS
146A Tribute to W. Henri Zay
147166 West 72nd Street.
148New York City.
150To the Musical Courier:
152As a teacher of singing, who has been a friend, a pupil, and an associate of W. Henri Zay, well-known voice teacher of New York City, who died so suddenly on November 2, may I pay a tribute to him and to his work.
154His death is a great loss, not only to his family and his friends but also to the profession of voice training. He brought to his work a great variety of talents, which lent unusual authority to his teaching. He was not only a fine musician, a composer, a writer, an athlete of note, and man of wide interests, but, through long study and endless experiment, he also knew how voices should be used and he was able to impart this knowledge. In his teaching he gave unstintingly of his time and energy, and his enthusiasm never cooled.
156He was an inspiring leader among those to whom the teaching of singing is not just a business, or a means of livelihood, but an art and a science in the service and advancement of which one must bring the highest devotion of which one is capable, all of ones energy and time, and an untiring enthusiasm which takes no count of self.
158Very sincerely yours,
159(Signed) HOMER MOWE.
160November 5, 1927.
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