Music: Disappointment

A grand piano is a commonplace, and it was curious how the great assembly in Carnegie Hall, Manhattan, stared at one last week as if the sleek, black, three-legged harp were some jungle animal. Some stared because they knew the secret of that sable instrument; others because their neighbors were staring. The latter had not read their programs:

“Mr. Lester Donahue, in his performance of Rachmaninov’s C Minor Concerto, will play a piano to which have been added certain improvements in tone and pedal— the invention of Mr. John Hays Hammond Jr.”

Mr. Hammond has claimed for his invention that it makes possible greater sonority, more lasting tone, alteration in the quality of the tone after it has been struck (TIME, Aug. 31). No wonder the assembly stared as Pianist Donahue, supported by Conductor Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra, sank his fingers into the keyboard. They heard Rachmaninov’s dense symphonic thunders rendered to the last chord, and they shook their heads. Definitely, it was a disappointment. There had been moments—in the adagio, in the arpeggiated chords of the cadenza—when the sustaining power of the instrument was evident. For the rest they did not know whether to felicitate Mr. Hammond on his invention or berate Pianist Donahue for what had sounded like miserable pedaling.