PERSONAL NOTES FROM LONDON.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 308, 29 December 1922, Page 3

PERSONAL NOTES FROM LONDON.

ARMISTICE DAY. MISS GARVEN'S CONCERT. (From Our Special Correspondent.) LONDON, November 16. Armistice Day, if not quite as universally kept as to the Moment of Silence as in other years, was observed in the neighbourhood of the Cenotapli in WhiteHall, Westminster, St. Paul's, and other places where men congregate with every mark of solemnity. The King and the two Princes in laying wreaths on the Cenotaph but preceded large numbers of people of all ranks. From the highest to the lowest even now, four days later, there is a queue down the middle of Whitehall passing and re-pausing the Cenotaph. Lady Allen was among those who assembled at the Colonial Office, and she had in her charge the wreath entrusted to her care by the boys of Palinerston North, who had sent their own collection to the High Commissioner for the purpose of putting on the Imperial Memorial !to all our missing men—their offering to the memory of their brothers who fell. J The High Commissioner wae most I highly pleased to carry out the behest lof the boys, and was very touched by their thought. Another wreath laid at the foot of this stately, yet simple, Memorial vas from the Overseas teachers now serving in London from the Dominions of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Mies Kathleen Garven had a very successful concert at the Wigmore Hall on Friday, and if she did not please all the critics—hardly to be looked for on her debut —she can congratulate herself on having- impressed them/highly by the volume of her voice. Mr. Ernest Newman, while he ears "'her voice, in its quieter moments, has a pleasing quality, but is inclined to overpass the mimical line when she puts a great deal of pressure on it." is rather severe on New Zealand. The Dominion is, one must believe, not wholly responsible for Mies Garven'e training. Mr. Newman is notoriously a difficult man to please, and often goes "off at the deep end" with quite a different view from that of other critics. That he has taken any notice of Miss Garven is something. A number of the papers who have serious musical criticism do not notice first concerts at all. The Groevenor Gallery Winter Exhibition was opened to the public on the 11th instant. Among the pictures is the presentation portrait of H.R.H.' Princess Mary, Viscountess Lascelles, painted by Mr. Oswald Birley, who was born at Auckland, New Zealand, in 1880.