AN OUTSTANDING EVENT

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22484, 19 August 1938, Page 4

AN OUTSTANDING EVENT

Lawrence Tibbett’s Recital THUNDEROUS APPLAUSE AND CHEERING There can be no doubt of the im•mediate success of Lawrence Tibbett at his first Christchurch recital, given in the Theatre Royal last evening. An enthusiastic audience that overflowed on to the stage, thundering applause and cheering, and a generous helping of encores to an already generous musical progi’amme, made the whole evening an outstanding event.' The tribute of applause was made as much to a very likeable man as to a very great artist in song. There should be no need of description of Mr Tibbett’s qualities as a singer: his voice, recorded on film-track and gramophone record, has already preceded him and made him known. His glorious baritone voice, with its endless reserve of tone, indeed made the theatre ring with sound, as the darkie in the final encore, “Glory Road,” made other rafters ring. Certainly in Mr Tibbett’s two opening groups, which included Handel’s “Where-e’er You Walk,’’ an old English song, “The Bailiff’s Daughter,’’ Schubert’s "Night and Dreams,’’ Brahms’s “My _ Love is Young,” Strauss’s “All Souls’ Day,” and Wolf’s “Ewig,” there was no sign of that effortless stream of sound he produces ever reaching an end. With such ease of production and control he accomplished anything he wished. Whether cue prefers the smooth flow of the Handel aria, the deep sound of the Schubert, the warmth'of feeling in the Brahms, the size of the Wolf song, one of the Michelangelo sonnets, must depend finally on individual taste. The opening phrase of the Wolf, with its bounding line, the intensity of tone at the phrase, “Leben muss sterben,” will be long remembered. To these' groups was added Brahms’s “Sapphic Ode," sung, in those searching final turns, with*an unfaltering breadth of sound. After these came three operatic arias, “Largo al Factotum,” from Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville,” the “Toreador Song.” from Bizet’s "Carmen,” and “O Star of Eve,” from Wagner’s “Tqnnhauser.” The famous barber’s patter song was delivered with tremendous energy and with a good deal of appropriate by-play. Needless to say, it brought the house down, A Russian group, Tschaikowsky’s "To the Forest,” Rachmaninoff’s “In the Silent Night,” Moussorgsky’s “Death the Commander,” and “Song of the Flea.” showed Mr Tibbett’s command of style in an entirely different field. The first Moussorgsky song is a terrifying piece of writing., Mr Tibbett got the full measure of it; to hoar it thus sung, with a curious dead tpno on some phrases, wgs a vivid experience. “The Song of the Flea” brought out some good satiric sounds. In their way, these Moussorgsky songs are not so much songs as short dramatic scenas. It was a relief after “Death the Commander" to hear Victor Hely-Hutchinson’s mock-Handelian “Old Mother Hubbard,” which is thoroughly good fun. with its humorous runs and final cadences, clinched with the proper shake of the head. Again by contrast came Somervell’s lovely setting of “Annabel Lee,” a selling that enhances the music of Poe’s words. Encores given were two. negro spirituals. “Shortenin’ Btead,” “Glory Road,” whose very names, as Mr Tibbett announced them, brought forth an outburst of cheers, “Without a Song,” “The White Dove," and “On the Road to Mandalay.” For some part of the audience this was what it had come to hear; Mr Tibbett sang all the songs with unfailing artistry. His accompanist, Mr Stewart Wille, played as well a group of solos. As an accompanist Mr Wille provided the right depth of sound for the singer, taking not a subordinate but an equal place in the presentation of the programme. The first Brahms accompaniment showed immediately the warmth of his playing In a romantic song. How beautifully, too, he managed the seductive cadence at the end of the Strauss song. His solo items were Liszt’s "Sonetto 104 del Petrarca”; Antonine Kammell’s “Giga,” presumably a new handling of an old form; Liszt’s arrangement of Schumann’s song, “Spring Night”; and, for an encore, one of Beethoven’s German dances. Perhaps in the Liszt “Sonetto” Mr Wille showed best his command of the piano, for though this is .not one of Liszt’s customary show pieces, it ranges over a good deal of the keyboard. developing a typically Lisztian melody; in his Italian vein, to a good climax. For this, Mr Wille had the grand manner of the concert pianist, of the kind that can play with technical difficulties and put them in their musical place. A further recital will be given on Saturday evening. (FJP)