Review

Reviewed Work(s): Peter and the Wolf: A Musical Tale for Children, Op. 67 by Sergei
Prokofiev
Review by: E. B.
Source: Music & Letters, Vol. 23, No. 3 (Jul., 1942), p. 264
Published by: Oxford University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/728237
Accessed: 16-09-2016 23:07 UTC

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264 MUSIC AND LETTERS

durable
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E. B.

Mozart, Divertimenti Nos. I & 2, in B flat major, for two Clarinets and Bassoon. (K
229; Einstein Ed. 439b.) Edited by Frederick J. Thurston. Scores and Parts.
(Boosey & Hawkes, London.) 3s. 6d. each.
Here are two little works out of four written by Mozart, probably in 1783, for two~
clarinets (or possibly two basset horns) and bassoon. They were issued about I813 with
the addition of parts for two horns by an unknown and insufficiently skilled arranger,
and subsequently in a variety of transcriptions, but are now published for the first time
in their original form. The music is on a very small scale, but mature and exquisite,.
showing to perfection Mozart's feeling for the quality of wind instruments and his mastery
in the handling of sonatina form, which to a fertile mind like his set problems of com-
pression perhaps more difficult than those of expansion inherent in the composition of
larger works.
Each Divertimento contains five movements, including two minuets (in the second'
and fourth place), with a slow piece in the middle and a portmanteau rondo at the end.
The lovely slow movements have been compared to the vocal JVotturni with wind accom-
paniment composed in 1783-one of the reasons for Einstein's placing these Divertimentil
in the same year. Five of these little works are listed in Kochel, but the fifth is probably
not authentic. There was also a sixth, obviously later, since it is merely an arrangement
of arias from ' Figaro ' and ' Don Giovanni', almost certainly not from Mozart's hand.
It is to be hoped that Mr. Thurston, whose editing is exemplary, will bring out Nos. 3
and 4 later to complete the set, so far as it is genuine. E. B.

Prokofiev, Sergei, Peter and the Wolf: a Musical Tale for Children, Op. 67. (Boo
Hawkes, London.) Miniature Score, 6s. Arrangement for Piano Solo by Tho
Dunhill. 5s.
In obedience to an official decree according to which music must be immediately
intelligible to the most casual of listeners, Prokofiev has lately simplified his once sophis-
ticated art to the point of childishness. Well, for the sort of picture-book music calle
for by the innocuous story of ' Peter and the Wolf' childishness is not only indicated
it becomes a positive quality. All the same, the music might have been better. Now an
again, it is true, Prokofiev's gift of coining an unforgettable phrase asserts itself. Th
themes of the plaintive duck (oboe) and the nagging grandfather (bassoon) are very good ;
but those of the wolf (three horns) and the cat (clarinet) are only passable-the latter
seems too jovial-while Peter's (strings) and the bird's (flute) are very poor. As a com-
position the thing does not hang together, but the musical incidents are apt to the tale
that disintegrates them. It is delivered by a speaker who again and again holds up the
limping progress of the score. A good feature of the text are the references to the
orchestral instruments used, the tone and character of which cannot fail to impress itself
on the minds of children who listen to the gramophone records of a work they are no
likely to hear at a concert. The miniature score, which forms part of the series reviewe
above, is most beautifully produced and the excellent piano arrangement, which achieve
an astonishing amount of effect without great technical difficulties, is decorated wit
some pretty vignettes. E. B.

Reviews of the following books, as

unavoidably held over :-
Darwin, Marx, Wagner: Critique of a
Secker & Warburg, London, 1942.)
Henry Lawes: Musician and Friend
(Modern Language Association of Ame
16s. 6d.

Philharmonic. By Thomas Russell. Illustrations by Alan Gregory. With an Intro-

duction by J. B. Priestley. pp. i8o. (Hutchinson, London, 1942.) 7s. 6d.
The Life of Anton Dvordk. By Paul Stefan. Translated by Y. W. Vance. pp. 336
(Greystone Press, New York, 1941.) $3.oo.

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