Further to my recent post, it has not been possible to establish the exact details of Sergei Rachmaninov’s recital in Glasgow. However, I do know that the date was 4th March 1935. Let us hope that some reader can provide me with more details. In 1943, the music critic at the Glasgow Herald reprises Herman Finck’s anecdote from a slightly different perspective. It is worth repeating.
‘When
Rachmaninov played here…another well known musician, in the lighter field of
music, was also in Glasgow. He was Herman Finck then conducting
the orchestra of a production of Edward German’s Merrie England visiting the King’s Theatre. Finck told us that when
walking along the corridor of his hotel, heard the sound of a piano coming from
one of the rooms. After listening for a time, and thinking the playing was very
fine, he asked a passing maid if she knew who the pianist was. She replied that
she couldn’t remember his name exactly, but it was something like ‘Rakky’, and
he was a foreigner.
“Well,
tell him from me that he certainly can play,” said Finck, who admitted later
that he felt pretty sick at sending such a message when he discovered who the
pianist really was.”
It
is surely strange how stories can morph in the telling and the retelling.
The Glasgow
Herald 30 March 1943 (with minor edits)
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