ABSTRACT
The sisters d’Aranyi arrived as a kind of reinforcement to the rescue-workers and rebuilders of music in Britain. Rescue was being done in three operations: improving performances of orchestras and soloists, making known the work of important contemporary or recent foreign composers, and giving British ones a better chance. By the turn of the century the heavy-rescue squads found their tasks lightening, especially after the foundation in 1895 of a permanent, professional orchestra for Promenade Concerts in the Queen’s Hall, which had been opened two years before. Henry J. Wood tuned his players to continental pitch and his listeners to good music. Tovey was the best musical scholar of his time, with a memory that startled people like Joachim and Adolf Busch. In 1913 as a pianist he was within memorizing distance of no fewer than sixty-five concerti, and once when asked how long it would take him to play his entire repertoire, estimated six to seven weeks.
