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[This anonymous review appeared in an unidentified English newspaper.
A cutting of the original is in the collection of myself, NN, tucked into a program for the International Celebrity Subscription Concerts, season 1927-1928 (England).
The cutting is undated, but internal evidence mentioning Pachmann's age places it in 1925.
A photograph of Pachmann is not reproduced here.
This web version is dated 2 October 2013.]
Two Thousand People See Pachmann Dance.
Unexpected End to a Mazurka.
Delighted Audience.
Par 1
The inimitable Pachmann held two thousand or more admirers enraptured
for a couple of hours at Queen's Hall yesterday afternoon.
Par 2
His hearers applauded, encored, insisted, cajoled their favourite into playing what really amounted to a second programme.
Only when an assistant had clamped down the piano, and an attendant had determinedly closed and curtained the doors of the
ante-room and shut the maestro in, would the audience think of retiring.
Par 3
As for Pachmann himself, he was all the time in a state of musical ecstacy.
He gave nobody a single dull moment.
Par 4
When he played Beethoven's Sonata Pathétique he waved his freed hands often as though inviting everybody
into the rapture of it all. He closed his eyes. His mobile mouth revealed the joy he felt.
Sometimes it almost appeared as though he would cease playing as he gloated over the beauty of the music.
Par 5
When he ended the exquisite adagio movement, he threw up his hands entranced.
Par 6
"Lovely!" he exclaimed.
Par 7
Presently he came to Chopin, and the "tear-laden sweetness" of a nocturne (Op. 55, No. 1 in F minor) was brought
out with all his wonderful tenderness.
Then came a mazurka by the same composer.
Capers.
Par 8
Pachmann became a light-hearted, buoyant young man again, though he is seventy-seven.
The music put a dance in everybody's heart, and at the conclusion the fine old musician jumped
from his seat and capered to the time of the mazurka, waving his hands,
first doing a little dance to the orchestra seats and then a repeat for the mass in front.
Par 9
He played Grieg to finish his programme. The Rigaudon, from the "in old style" suite, is piquant, lively, melodic.
Par 10
Up went both Pachmann's hands at the end, and he was hurrying off when the lure of the piano held him.
Turning round he replayed without seating himself a few bars with the liveliest lilt in them.
Par 11
After that he had to suffer the penalty of five demands for more.