Allied Quartet – new works by Bax – Mrs Coolidge

Musical life in Britain was strangely reduced immediately after the Great War, the most remarkable aspect being the almost total absence of foreign artists. However, musicians from the newly created state of Czechoslovakia, such as Ema Destinnova, Jan Heřman and the Bohemian Quartet, were quick to reappear, as were French stars such as Emma Calve and Alfred Cortot, Russians such as Benno Moiseiwitsch and Joseph Coleman, and the occasional Italian such as Tetrazzini or Busoni. (Even though Italy had been on the same side as Britain in the war, the majority of her musicians were slow to return.) Hungarians were in short supply: the Hungarian Quartet would be back by the early 1920s, but Joseph Szigeti and the new Budapest and Lener Quartets would take a little longer to arrive. Anti-German sentiment had run so high during the war that it would be years before the heavy Austro-German presence in British concerts would be restored; and it would never regain the level it had reached before 1914. German-speaking musicians who had just been establishing themselves on the London scene when war came did not feel welcome for a number of years. The Klingler Quartet did not play in London again until 1928. Adolf Busch, who would end up giving more concerts in London than anywhere else, did not make his rentree until 1925, and did not bring his quartet until 1930. Even Kreisler, beloved of English audiences, left it until 4 May 1921 to play in London again – he need not have worried, as after his ‘Vivaldi’ and Viotti concertos at Queen's Hall Dame Nellie Melba and Albert Sammons presented him with laurel wreaths.

The net result of the chauvinistic attitude of British audiences was that for several seasons musical programmes had a somewhat porridgy, insular air. Of course, this situation meant that there was more work for native musicians, but it was not a happy state for true artistry to flourish in. One saving grace was that some of the musicians who had come to Britain as refugees had made such strong ties that it was a while before they returned home. The Allied String Quartet, for instance, with its strong Belgian contingent, kept going longer than one might have expected, which was good for Tertis.