(2 of 4)
Two famed European string quartets recently made U. S. debuts:
Aguilar Lutes. Some years ago a Spanish gentleman, by name Don Francisco Aguilar, was returning home after one of his days spent as royal physician at the Court of young King Alfonso. Passing through one of Madrid's ancient, crooked streets in the still twilight, he stopped to listen to a blind musician. The man's face was tinted and seamed like a Rembrandt burgomaster's. The instrument on which he played was even more unusual. Most people would have called it an outlandish guitar or mandolin. But Don Francisco, cultivated, scholarly, knew it for a lute.
From the 20th Century point of view the lute is antique, almost obsolete.* Its name is derived from the Arabic al'ud (the wood). It is akin to the biblical instrument called the psaltery.
The lute had its heyday from the 14th to the 17th Century. It has a pear-shaped body built of pine or cedar staves pieced together like the crescent divisions of a melon. Its neck (lengths varied) has a fretted keyboard over which are stretched perhaps four, perhaps as many as 24 gut strings. Lutanists (musicians who play the flute are flautists; musicians who play the lute are Internists or lutenists) plucked or twanged the strings either with their fingers or a plectrum. Because of its spoon-shaped body the instrument cannot be confused with the modern guitar which has a flat bottom joined to the sound board by separate ribs. In appearance it is more like the mongrel, wire-strung mandolin.
All these things the late Don Francisco Aguilar knew. He had once made a study of the lute and its literature. He was further aware that Johann Sebastian Bach had written for it, that Georg Friedrich Handel as late as 1720 had made a part for it in his Esther. He remembered, too, that a Granadan. Baltasar Ramirez, had been the greatest lute virtuoso in 16th Century Europe; that the art of lute playing had supposedly died in 1790 with the German Christian Gottlieb Scheidler. Hence he listened with a peculiar appreciation to the music of the blind man. He went home, spoke enthusiastically of its sweetness and its delicacy. Soon after four lutes were ordered for the Aguilar household and the four children, Ezequiel, Pepe, Paco and Elisa, were set to practising.
Today in Europe the young Aguilars are famed. Ezequiel is the eldest although it would be difficult to tell, so much alike are they with small sleek heads, black pop eyes. But Ezequiel is the leader, plays the first lute, shows his authority by wearing wherever he goes a flowing Spanish capa.
As musicians their reputations are uniquely and indissolubly bound into one. They are the only famed lutanists in the world. Spanish Composers Manuel de Falla, Isaac Albeniz and Joaquin Nin have written music for them. Paris, London, Brussels have applauded their playing. Fortnight ago they made their U. S. debut in Manhattan. Last week seven other cities heard them—Boston, Princeton, N. J., Greencastle, Ind., St. Louis, Lake Forest, Ill., Chicago, Providence. The verdict everywhere was the same: that here are musicians possessed of immaculate technique and a fine, poetic sense of unity. Lutes if played by lesser artists drop into the plunking monotony of mandolins, but the Aguilars make music marvelous for smooth, glowing patterns.
The Lener String Quartet comes from Budapest. Its members are Jeno Lener, first violin, Joseph