Relayed from THE QUEEN'S HALL (Sole Lessees, Messrs. Chappell and Co., Ltd.)
Russian Composers
THE B.B.C. SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
(Principal Violin, CHARLES WOODHOUSE)
Conducted by SIR HENRY WOOD
HAROLD WILLIAMS (Baritone)
SOLOMON (Pianoforte)
COMPOSER of the most successful piece of music that ever came out of Russia, by virtue of which the man in the street knows not only his name, but how to pronounce it, Rachmaninov has written far finer music than the noise made by that tin for so long tied to his tail. As early as 1899, before the curse was laid upon him, he came to England and distinguished himself as composer, conductor, and pianist at a Philharmonic concert. Since then ho has toured the world as a pianist of great distinction, composed a deal of music of a lithe and graceful beauty, of an unashamed health and sanity, in an artistic age that pretends to find small virtue in these qualities. This concerto is Rachmaninov at his best. He now lives in the United
States, amongst a people to whom he has expressed himself as grateful, for no sooner had he landed than the Americans, having the interests of American culture at heart, shamelessly jazzed the notorious prelude, and lifted the curse from its unhappy author.
ALEXANDRE MOSSOLOV , though he is only thirty-one, has already made a name in Russia, for even in that land of shattering artistic revolutions, he has found a method of revolting which is all his own. This work, composed in 1928, is in the form of an overture, and its programme is simply the steady rhythm of a factory working at full pressure; though behind the mere picture there is conveyed the sense of awe and exaltation which cannot fail to possess the man of imagination confronted with the powerful weapons of attack and defence man has set up under the very nose of antagonistic nature.