From the ARCHIVE

The pseudonymous ‘Lancastrian’ (Dr William Hardman) interviews virtuoso violinist Adolph Brodsky, then principal of the Royal Manchester College of Music

FROM THE STRAD 1913

JANUARY VOL.23 NO.273

Iwill not attempt to describe my feelings as for the first time I grasped the warm hand of him whom I have so long worshipped at a distance. I could honestly rhapsodize, but I will restrain myself, convinced that there is no man living who would appreciate it less than the subject of this essay. Dr. Brodsky is a fit subject for rhapsody, and both personally and by his remarkable career would justify it, but truth to tell there is about him a natural reserve and modesty, an almost self deprecatory instinct which instinctively tells one that anything of the nature of panegyric would be extremely distasteful to him. Suffice it to say that I should not have considered it a greater honour to shake hands with any European monarch.

In person he is of medium height, but of very powerful and massive frame, a grand head surmounts a healthy, ruddy, clean shaven countenance which beams with kindness and good nature. At the same time the whole conveys that sense of immense power and reserve force which one is certain must be associated with such a remarkable career.

I said I had been struck with the wonderful success he had attained in highly training and yet preserving and educing the individuality of his pupils. He said: “Yes. We always try to encourage the development of a pupil’s individuality.” From certain great schools on the continent I had thought the playing of the pupils too automaton-like. They seemed years before they came into their own. I had even entertained this idea with regard to Prague. I told this to Dr. Brodsky. “Ah,” he said, “Sevcik is a great technician, a very great technician.” For individualising their pupils Brodsky and Auer are perhaps the most successful teachers in Europe.

Interesting it was to talk of Dr. Brodsky’s long and close intimacy with Grieg and his wife Nina, Tschaikovsky, and Brahms, to get first hand particulars of these great composers. Fancy a tea party with Brahms, Grieg and his wife, Tschaikovsky, and Dr. and Mrs. Brodskythe host and hostess all sat together, and Brahms full of a ponderous humour boning the jam and declaring he would not let anyone else have any, ending up with Nina Grieg singing exquisitely the beautiful songs of her husband!

Brodsky gave me some interesting personal details about Brahms, with whom he was on very intimate terms, and for whom he has evidently a profound respect. Upon my remarking that some of Brahms’s music did not appeal to me, and that generally it left me unmoved, he said: “Well, if it’s any consolation to you I may tell you that Tschaikovsky never liked Brahms’s music. We used to say to him: ‘Ah! someday you will like it.’ But he never did to the day of his death.”

PAUCE/NAÏVE