WORLD OF MUSIC

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 5 December 1925, Page 16

WORLD OF MUSIC

IN HAWERA DISTRICT SCHOOL

The progress made by the Hawera school orchestra has been specially gratifying to Mr. Fox, the enthusiastic tutor of the hoys. The Flute and Dr.uin Band is also going ahead by leaps and bounds.

MALE CHOIRS. The tourists who went to Wanganui on Monday report a most' successful and enjoyable time during ffhe cooperation with their brother choir in Wanganui. They were given a great reception and acquitted themselves well, according to the judgment of the local critics. Their combined effort with the Wanganui Choir was an outstanding success. The Male Choir in Wanganui was founded in 1898 ai/d one foundation member alone, H. Meverman, a bass, is left. He lias sixty performances to his credit. One of the first tenors, Mr. R Mathison, joined in 1899 and he has forty-nine credited to him. In Christchurch membership is very exclusive. There are only thirty voices, but all are picked singers. Mr. J W. Velvin, who heard the Christchurch choir -a week or two since, says it is very good indeed. Included were some of the Cathedral boy choristers, and the choir took part songs with four or five parts. The effect is wonderful.

AMATEUR OPERA. There is evidently a lot of activity iri the realms of Amateur Operatic Societies in New Zealand at present — Veronique in Wanganui; Pinafore and the Pirates in Invercargill; an original musical drama, “The Abbess of Whitby,” in Auckland. Hawera had “The Toreador”- and now is on the look-biit for something more for 1f126.

personal. A Hull daily paper reports a tremendous success achieved by Mr. Hubert Carter, the New Zealand tenor, at. a song recital ‘arranged by Miss Reba Cohen, also a New Zeaiandbr. Miss Cohen, it should be added, is a sister of Mrs. S. Hart, of Hawera.

Commenting on Mr. Carter’s singing, the musical critic said that he fully justified the big reputation made since coining to England. He was compared to the best of the Continental tenors and was said to possesses consummate artistry, Ms command of volume, breathing, phasing and general interpretation proving him, possesses remarkable equipment. Miss Cohen possesses a high and pure soprano voice, but in control, quality * and interpretation, manifested in a, repertoire of songs ranging from the coloratUre operatic excerpts to the charming simplicity of a group of baby songs by Miss Mary Blackburn; she was outstanding. In all her items there was tone, colour, and expression, and her technique was remarkably good.

INTRODUCING IT TO US

MR ALFRED HILL’S MISSION

Mr. Alfred Hill, the well-known New Zealand musician and composer, has got nine months’ leave of absence from the New South Wales Conservatorium and the Royal Sydney Apollo Club to enable him to accept a special musical engagement in the United States, says a. Press correspondent in Wellington. M. Henri Verbrugghen, formerly conductor of the New South Wales State Orchestra, and now in charge of the Minneapolis Orchestra, has arranged for Mr. Hill to conduct some of his Maori compositions with the Minneapolis Orchestra, and the Chicago choir. Among the works to be performed are tbe “Ra-Ha” chorus from Mr. Hill’s “liinemoa.”

“1 am going to do my best to boost New Zealand and its music,” writes Mr. Hill to a friend in Wellington, “because, although by chance I was born in Australia, all my early training and ideals originated in New Zealand. The Maori idiom entered into my soul and blood, and nothing can eradicate it. I have lately collected some new Maori songs (words and music) and when I come over in December I should like to get some more. I’ll make America hum tunes as well as jazz before I’m through.”

“LOHENGRIN.” SEVENTY-FIFTH YEAR. The seventy-fifth anniversary, of .the first production of “Lohengrin” was attained this year, a circumstance which gave enhanced interest to the performance of the first and third acts of this opera, at the Royal Sydney Philharmonic Society’s recent concert. It was through the kindly offices of Liszt that “Lohengrin” was first performed. on August 28, 1850, at Weimar; and herein he gave fresh proof of his disinterested and whole-hearted friendship for Wagner. He was prompt to recognise the composer’s genius, and accordingly helped him in every possible way at a time when courage was required on liis part, as one high in royal favour, to declare liimself the friend of a man who had been driven into exile because of his association with the political troubles of 1849. Liszt himself directed the first performance, when the work made an immediate appeal—indeed, a sensation was created hv its superb orchestral scoring, beginning in such an original way in the Prelude, where the theme commences in the highest register of the strings, and produces one of the most ethereal effects in music. The opera has always been one of the most popular in the Wagnerian repertory.

THE “CHORAL” SYMPHONY. The Conservatorium Choir and Orchestra. engaged last week in another important task, under Mr. Arundel Orchard’s baton, namely, the perform-

ante of Beet hoven’s Choral. Symphony, says the. Sydney Morning Herald. This work, the last of the Immortal Nine — the claims of the Jena symphony are still too vague to be discussed —is justly regarded as one of the greatest of the master’s works, but mainly because of its great length and the very difficult and un vocal character of the choral part, it is but infrequently performed. Many years have elapsed since it was heard in Sydney, but Sydney is not singular in that _ respect/ Even in London and New York conductors readily recognise the toimidable nature of the test involved in singing the choral nart of this symphony. Beethoven completed the score a little more than 100 years ago, and the first performance of it took place on May 7, 1824, at the Karnthnerthor Theatre in Vienna. Schindler declares that never in his life had he heard such applause as then greeted the work. The second movement, the famous scherzo —probably the finest ni existence —was interrupted by applause, and its repetition was demanded Beethoven, in the midst of tne orchestra,- deaf and engrossed m his score, was pathetically oblivious of the commotion at the end of the performance He became aware of it only when .Fraulein Unger, one of the soloists, turned him round or induced him to turn round. The realisation that he had not turned earlier because he could not hear what was going on. says Sir George Grove, acted like an electric shock upon the people and a. volcanic explosion of •sympathy and admiration followed. Yet some y • elapsed before the importance of this symphony was fully recognised. Richard Wagner, who elaborated his views in a review of it written for_a performance given under lnm in Dresden in 1846, was pi'obably the first to appraise its greatness. The composei s earlier schemes of the work did not contemplate the choral finale; but Beethoven had 31 years before been attracted by Schiller’s ode, An dm Freude,” as a subject for music, and after much pondering ho wrote the finale, as we know it to-day, basing it upon this ode.

The olay “Rose Marie” in three months wiped out the loss sustained on last year’s operations at Drury. Lane Theatre. It also paid for the production, .and made a profit sufficient to pay a 5 per cent dividend.