Madame Adami, piano
Recorded August 15, 1919

Thanks to Bryan Bishop for allowing me to use his excellent transfers. You can find this and many other wonderful selections and information at his website: [ Ссылка ].

Marjorie Hayward was a very fine English violinist who led the Virtuoso String quartet from 1924 to 1939. Can find more recordings than info.


Madame Adami was one of the earliest of the regular accompanists in the recording studios at a time when both Landon Ronald and Hamilton Harty were also accompanists. She made her first records in the very early 1900s, well before the 1914-1918 War and by the time she retired in the thirites she had made a very large number of records indeed. It was once suggested that she would have qualified for the title of "most recorded artist" had that sort of distinction been fashionable in those days.

The piano was extremely difficult to record by the old acoustic process. Much depended on the ability of the pianist to adapt to the limitations of the process. Madame Adami was particularly successful in this and the recording engineers regarded her as utterly dependable; she knew exactly what could and could not be done.

She was a quiet little woman, rather short, soberly dressed and, where the occasion required it, self-effacing. There was never any doubt about her musicianship and the established artists with whom she recorded treated her as an equal. She was, in fact, the accompanist of choice for most of the artists recording for the home market.

With less experienced artists, at auditions or making a test record, she could be a tower of strength, though quite capable of the astringent aside when pretension was penetrated. Though she was kindness itself she had the sort of humour which is nonetheless mordant for being modestly expressed.

свернуть