NORMAN NOTLEY (Baritone)
MRS. NORMAN O'NEILL (Pianoforte)
Rameau's La Poide. a celebrated piece written for the harpsichord, is an early example of programme music of the nalvest kind. Its principal phrase plainly illustrates the crowing of a hen that has just laid an egg. Haydn, who uses a somewhat similar phrase in his symphony also entitled La Poule, has been accused of paying Rameau the homage of plagiarism-and has been as hotly defended. The matter is really of no great consequence—after all, both were borrowing from the inoffensive hen.
Schumann, one of Chopin's earliest and greatest admirers, reviewed this scherzo in the following terms : 'It is so overflowing with tenderness, boldness, love, and contempt that it may he compared, not inappropriately, to a Byron poem.' That is an odd application of the word scherzo, which merely means ' a jest.' but Schumann's description is, after all, a reasonable and decidedly intelligent one.
Hugo Wolf is at last coming into his own. For years the discriminating have lauded his genius as a song-writer, placing him on a level with the greatest of lieder composers, and now scarcely a day passes without a broadcast of one or more groups of Wolf's songs. Those who still doubt that the greater public is the ultimate judge of what, out of all that is good. is worth preserving, may read in this fact a refutation of their scepticism.
These lines which preface John Ireland's ' 'Island Spell ' are taken from a poem entitled ' In the Wood of Finvara,' which is one of five poems collectively called' In Ireland,' by Arthur Symons. The delicate languor of the whole poem, which cannot unfortunately be fully quoted here, is skilfully and beautifully reflected in Ireland's music. The piece datos from 1912, and the intervening years have served to cement it firmly in the solo pianist’s repertory.