BETTER MUSICAL TASTE

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXV, Issue 212, 7 August 1945, Page 2

BETTER MUSICAL TASTE

Music hns come to mean much more in the lives of the people of many lands in recent years, in the opinion of Mr Isador Goodman, the famous pianist, who is to give a concert in the Palmerston North Opera House tomorrow night. Several causes, he said in an interview, might bo held responsible for the remarkable surge forward in musical interest. After six years of war, during which opportunities for musical activity have been severely restricted, interest in artistic endeavour has been revived to a greater extent than might have occurred in normal times.

“Personally,” Mr Goodman said, “I am inclined to believe that one of the most important factors in this musical renaissance has been the steady advance in the taste of the people. It is most gratifying to an artist to find that the musical appreciation of his audiences has progressed. That has certainly happened in the last ID years.”’Whereas audiences’ requests a decade ago were largely for the Hungarian rhapsodies of Liszt and other similar music, presently audiences were more interested in such modern composers as Debussy, Ravel, ancDDe Falla, accepting and enjoying music which they formerly classed as advanced and daring.