Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1956-08-05
NEWS OF MUSIC
By DAY THORPE

piano students and teachers to
the YWCA for a piano lesson.
1t gave promise of being an
occasion of rather rare good
fortune not only for pianists
but for music lovers in general.
for Frau Kraus has for 20
years or more been known as
one Of the superlative pianists
ofssthe world, and while what
she could do with an aggrega-
tion of strange and heteroge-
neOus music students could
scarcely be foretold. still here
WIS a musician of the highest
reclame, and what she had to
say would be worth hearing.
Thirty-f1ve turned UP. The
faces Of our best pianists. with
Q single exception, we're absent.
No longer students. these men
and women of course have
nothing more to learn. and 1t is
clear they do not suffer from
curiosity. OF the half dozen
who played for Frau Kraus.
none was of the quality heard
In the National Symphony con-
test last spring. but they all
showed an eagerness to profit
by their afternoon with the
master.
Technique Expresses Mind
Lii Kraus is a handsome and
dynamic woman of 48, with
black hair and intense black
eyes. Her pupils who gathered
to play for her in the YWCA
were in no way a part OF an
act; she listened to each with
the greatest concentration, and
then analysed the performance
in minute detail, and with a
courtesy that never seemed to
be contradicted by the thor
oughness Of her criticism. She
was able to inspire love for the
drama of a meditation or the
heavenly expressivity Of a
Schubert melody by the most
passionate outburst, by kissing
the keys of the piano in adora-
ton, but the basis of her
teaching was how to make
fingers and body create what is
in the mind.
you feel that you can't
play that passage. Frau Kraus
told a girl working on the
Schumann G minor sonata.
"You think that the technical
difficulties are insuperable. But
I say that it's because you
have graSped the problem.
understood the music, not
quite completely in your mind
that you can't make your fin
gers do what you want them
to. You know, l believe that
there really is no distinction
between technique and inter-
probation. They are the same
thing, except when they are
wrenched apart in discussion"
And then she validated her OBJ
servations by practical inStruc-
ton of how the wrist should be
held in spread arpeggios, how
the little finger should be
straight, how the key should be
struck, and countless other de-
tails.
On MOzart'S RepetitiOns
''Never use echo effects in
Mozart" she told a boy who
was overphrasing. Invariably,
when Mozart repeats a group
Of notes as in this movement.
it's because he wants to in
tensify the expression. not
because he wants to en-
bellish what he's already said.
You must never make dynamic
variation Just for the sake Of
something new"
Frau Kraus thinks Of
Mozart piano music in rela-
ton to Mozart operas, Bach
keyboard music in relation to
Bach cantatas, Schubert four
hand music in relation to
Schubert symphonies.
Her feeling for q Mozart
movement was expressed by
remarks such ~ Here's
Papageno," This II from
Figaro" Mozart says Tn
going home now"
A girls rendition Of the q
major duet from the "Clavieru-
bung" lead Frau Kraus to say
that It is DISASTROUS to play
Bach on the piano as he should
be played on the harpSichord,
hat the legato and dynamic
vkfiation Of the piano we know
was not adverse to the Bach
style since 1t Is q part Of his
vocal music.
She herself played little but
very much to the point; her
genius was In getting those
she was helping to play better
at once.
1t was miraculous to me how
this woman could spend a half
hour each with five COM
pletely new musical individu-
alities, throw herself into each
problem with the unfeigned
interest she would have if she
was shown newly discovered
Schubert sonata. and in every
case apparently start the pupil
on the way to better music by
first instilling better music in
his nina and then showing
him how to create it.
l can no more tell the reader
how she did this by quoting
her than I could describe an
actor by citing his lines.
But I think there was no
one in the YWCA who did not
have the feeling that he was
IN the presence of a very great
teacher. and since there is no
real distinction between tech
nique and Interpretation, that
1Hn q &