New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-02-11
BUS0NI in AN ALL
LTzT PROGRAMME
Second of Symphony So
ciety's Composers Con-
certs Attracts ThrOng.
BY Fl. z. KREHBIEL.

It would seem TO be a reasonable
conclusion that Mr.. Walter Damrosch,
in arranging his series of what he
calls Master Composer Concerts" had
an eye to the presence "in our midst
as the phrase goes) Of nearly all the
panoforte virtuosi Of large significance
in the world, and that his aim was
chiefly to make an appeal with their
specialties, or at least with the works
in which everybody knew they could
and would make a more or less sem
sational effect.
In a season crowded as this season
is with concerts in which every com
poser of note is represented over and
over again, no other reason than that
suggested comes to mind. Critics, who
profess an attitude of discrimination,
tell us on every occasion that an "all
Beethoven" or an call Mozart" or
an call Bach" or an "all Schumann"
concert is a WEAKNESS to the flesh as
we'll as to the spirit.
Now the world is pretty well agreed
that Beethoven. Mozart, Bach and
Schumann were creative geniuses OF
the highest order. The same cannot be
said Of List or Rubinstein; yet we had
a concert out of the regular subscrip-
ton season by the Symphony Society
Yesterday afternoon, devoted wholly 10
LISTS music, and we arc soon TO be
called on to listen for two hours or
more to Rubinstein, for whom, 1t can
be said, at least, that he adhered to
aesthetic conceptions which the far less
.aginative List could not follow.
The why, wherefore. raison d'etre
and all that sort of thing of yesterdays
concert outside of the financial was, we
imagine, Busoni, who played the piano
forte. sometimes supported, sometimes
unsupported, by the orchestra, for over
an hour. And large audience-almost
as large an audience as Aeolian Hall
would hold-heard and applauded him.
He played the second concerto, the
two solos which affect TO tell stories in
pianoforte tones of legends related OF
two saints (both named Francis-one
of Assist and one of Paoia), and the
variations on the "Dies irae' called
"The Dance Of Death" Already a great
deal of Licztian music; but before and
between these pieces the audience was
RECALLED with lies Preludes," the slow
movement from the Faust Symphony"
and that emptiest Of empty clap-trap
pieces, "The Battle Of the Huns"
The legendary stories were those OF
"St. Francis of Assist Preaching to the
Birds" and "St Francis of Paola Walk
ing on the Waves" Thus ran the title
Of the latter piece on the programme,
and it is TO the same effect in the Ger
man and French names which the com
poser gave the pianoforte etude: 1t
would appear, however, from the sheet
of programmatic notes. distributed IN
the hall that the legend of the Paulan
saint had nothing to say either about
St. Francis "auf den Wogen schrei-
tend" or "marchant sur les hots"; but
tina. he sailed across the straits OF
Messina on his cloak.
From a musical point of view II is
quite matter of indifference whether
the saint strobe across the turbulent
waters around Scylla and Charybdis
or was waited over them with the
corner OF mantle. on which he
stood. for a sail The pianoforte study
nav he technically valuable; it is not
POLITICALLY edifying: D.
Popularity Mr. Damrosch seems 20