Bandmistress

If Andrew Carnegie had been alive last week he would have felt richly rewarded for having given Manhattan a fine concert hall. Great music was played there by the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Boston Symphony, the New York Philharmonic. Another impressive concert commemorated the 100th birthday of the bearded little Scot who made such hearings possible. With music of a different calibre there was a newcomer at Carnegie Hall last week. She was Edith Lorand, trim, dark-haired Hungarian who fiddles and conducts an orchestra simultaneously.

For two hours and a half Miss Lorand exhibited such energy and endurance that she left her audience feeling limp. A Haydn symphony was over her depth but she whisked through it boldly, with flashing technique. Dances suited her better, particularly those of her native Hungary. Then she would get wild-eyed, sway from side to side, swing occasionally on her 15 players who appeared to be so thoroughly trained that they scarcely needed the whip of her bow.

The Lorand orchestramen know what it is to rehearse twelve hours a day, seven days a week. They are not allowed to answer back, not allowed to overeat, discouraged from marrying. But in spite of their rigorous discipline, their playing has the lush abandon which distinguishes almost all Hungarian orchestras, takes on particular magic late at night when good wine keeps them company. The Lorand orchestra would be a smash-hit in a night club but night clubs are forbidden. Ambitious Edith Lorand refuses to be a mere entertainer, although serious critics may rate her as such. Hers is a concert organization, she claims. It is led by the only woman conductor who has ever kept a troupe of men completely submissive.

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