Word: harpsichords
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...objects, the one as a bed-ridden patriarch, the other as a sympathetic country doctor from this side of the water. The direction is brisk, the screenplay properly ominous, and some one has written a remarkably lively musical score, which is performed on what sounds like a bar-room harpsichord. One trusts that Miss Rutherford's long deferred American fame will now at length, be firmly secured...
...range of tone qualities is so great and varied that one is often tempted to look and make sure he is using only one instrument. In Diaz's hands, the guitar becomes an organ with a hundred stops--but infinitely more expressive. At one point it sounds like a harpsichord; at another, like a carillon, or like a piano. In melodic passages Diaz's shifts were so smooth and his vibrato so intense that the tone was violin-like. During a Villa-Lobos dance his forceful, resonant bass had a brass quality. Such versatility would in itself distinguish his playing...
...best seller: Vivaldi's Four Seasons. In its pursuit of perfection, the group takes four full days to record a 4O-min. LP. The result is a luxurious, butter-smooth string tone, an artful blending of the orchestra's twelve instruments (six violins, two cellos, two violas, harpsichord, bass), a dynamic control that is the envy of other instrumentalists. Also to be envied: the fact that I Musici gets along harmoniously without a conductor...
Bach's Sonata No. 3 in E major for violin and klavier opened the program. In the classic manner, the gamba, with its forest of tuning pegs, doubled the continuo of the harpsichord. The trio maintained a nice balance; its members played to each other. But slippery intonation and lack of clarity marred the violin's performance, and the harpsichord indulged in unjustified rubatos and changes of tempi...
...parts of the Sonata No. 2 in D major for gamba and klavier, the double-manualed harpsichord sounded as if it were sporadically unwinding. It is no criticism of the gamba to observe that it lacks intensity in the ranges where the cello would have it, but the notes themselves seemed lackadaisically defined in the fast passages, and the general shape of the concluding fast movement was unclear...