NEWCASTLE'S MUSICAL HERITAGE AN INTRODUCTION By ...

thought of performing with a bunch of singers, no matter how fine, is not recorded
but the following comment attributed to Ysaye following a similar tour in England
in 1891 might give a clue to their thoughts in general. ‘If I do not say more about
the tour it is simply because there is nothing to say. I travel with two emptyheaded
singers- they sing like cockatoos- with whom one cannot exchange a
single idea’. One of the artists Harrison presented at his celebrity concerts
around this time, 23 November 1910 to be precise, was the outstanding Russian
concert pianist, Vladimir De Packmann. De Packmann was an eccentric, or he
cultivated eccentric behaviour when performing (he was not alone in this) in a
way that is unknown today amongst ‘serious’ artists. He would start playing a
piece – say by Chopin – suddenly stop – and directly address the audience with
“That is not how Chopin should be played, this is how he should sound”. I
suppose audiences went to his piano recitals hoping to witness a moments
eccentricity and give them something to pass on to their grandchildren, which is
confirmed to some extent by the following excerpt from a local press review of
the time:
‘Indeed his admirers now look for them (platform eccentricities) as a matter of
course and as a legitimate part of their entertainment and were he to discard
those peculiar mannerisms which are his own exclusive stock in trade, the
Russian pianist would doubtless disappoint many of his audience’
Once asked for his opinion as to whom he considered the greatest living pianist,
De Packmann piously rejoined, after due reflection, “Godowsky is the second
greatest”. He was nevertheless an outstanding Chopin interpreter and had the
distinction, when he died, of being one of only two pianists born in Chopin’s
lifetime who lived long enough to make gramophone recordings.
Harrison’s Ballad Concerts took place in the Olympia, Northumberland Road,
until 1899 and then in the Town Hall. Percy Harrison and his uncle Thomas
entered into concert management it is said, to educate the musical tastes of the
people, but they were also a couple of astute business men and when I noticed a
note in one of the Harrison programmes, cancelling the intervals at future
Newcastle concerts, my interest was aroused. It was the 6 th October 1899 when
a notice appeared in a Harrison concert programme that read: -
‘Mr Harrison begs respectfully to announce that at the suggestion of many of
his Subscribers and supporters he has decided to abolish the interval in the
programme of his concerts for the forthcoming season.
Experience and observation have shown that very few persons (and
constituting a very small percentage indeed of the audience) leave the Hall at the
Interval, and it is not an unreasonable complaint on the part of the larger number
who remain in their seats, that there should be a waste of time in the middle of
the programme, for which there is no apparent necessity.
Having therefore experimentally eliminated the Interval from his programmes on
one or two occasions, and being very pleased with the results, Mr HARRISON
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