A PIANOFORTE RECITAL

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22388, 29 April 1938, Page 6

A PIANOFORTE RECITAL

PLEASING ARTISTRY

MISS CARA HALL’S PROGRAMME

Miss Cara Hall, the winner of the 1937 Royal Academy of Music scholarship, gave a charming pianoforte recital to a large and warmly enthusiastic audience in the Jellicoe Hall last night. The tone qualities and gradations that she drew from the poor, and unresponsive piano that it was her misfortune to have to play on were remarkable. It is not fair on any pianist to have to play in public on an instrument that is incapable of giving the tone colours which the active mind of the artist is all the time requiring, for the art of the pianist is entirely in the choosing of tone and moment for each note played. Last night’s instrument, in its lower register particularly, simply could not give quality the moment anything more than mezzoforte was required of it, nor could it even give quantity adequate to normal climaxes, or to full-toned pieces such as the two' Brahms Rhapsodies which the recitalist really played with excellent vigour, masterly rhythm, and with a technique of tone-production which on a good instrument would have drawn out full resonant tone of rich quality.

Miss Hall’s programme was excellently chosen, for the compositions were of high musical value, and from the recital point of view showed the many-sidedness of her artistry and her technical equipment. She opened with Szanto’s arrangement of Bach’s Organ Prelude and Fugue in G minor. Her choice of lone for the opening sentences showed what' fine poise and mood control this young player possesses, and, more than that, it showed a sense of perspective, an ability to view her piece as a whole, for from this controlled beginning she was able to build the work in a shapely, satisfying manner that revcajed her full understanding of the music. A Schumann work followed (Allegro, op. 8). and then a group of Chopin pieces—the Revolutionary Study, a Nocturne (Op. 55, No. 2). and the G fiat Impromptu, and all showed the possession of an imaginative mind, technical facility, and fine ability to produce a melody tone that sings out clearly over its sufficiently subdued accompanying harmonies. Two Brahms Rhapsodies (the B Minor and the G Minor), handled with fine breadth for so young a player, formed her third group of pieces, and for her final group she played “Rococo" (Palmfren), “Night Fancies” (Benjamin )ale), and “Blue Danube" (Strauss-Schultz-Evler). The dainty and delightful simplicity expressed in "Rococo” was charmingly portrayed, and so were the contrasted fancies in the Benjamin Dale composition; while “The Blue Danube” with its clear but supple rhythm, its intertwining ornamentation, the facility; of its octave skipping, made a pleasing and refreshing finale to the recital. Variety to the purely instrumental, work of Miss Cara Hall was supplied by the two groups of vocal items which Mr Norman Boscher sang to the sensitive accompaniments played by Miss Althea Harley-Slack. His careful work in all the songs proved thoroughly pleasing to the audience, and to the group which included Margaret Dixon's “Tribute” (in which a violin obbligato was added by Mr Robert Clark6) he added as encore the song “You in a Gondola.” (E.J.)