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Italian Concerts Encore Paris I n spring 1931, Ambassador and Madame Garrett engaged our quartet for a tour ofmajor Italian cities to benefit the National Committee ofMothers and Children for Prevention ofChildhood Tuberculosis . The Garretts provided all our transportation and expenses so that all concert receipts would go directly to this worthy cause. The Italian announcements were impressive: "Concerto benejicio ofJerta daffa L.L.E.E. ambasciatore e l'ambasciatrice d'America. " What a regal example of the Garretts' customary generosity! Our tour began after another luxurious Atlantic crossing on the Italian Line to Genoa, where we were met by Ernesto, the Garretts' chauffeur , and proceeded to Rome in their spacious Lincoln limousine. We were elegantly housed in the Rospigliosi palace (the American Embassy residence) for one week. The palace contains Guido Reni's celebrated painting Aurora. Our quartet played two concerts in the grand ballroom of the palace for small, distinguished audiences. Between rehearsals and concerts, I managed to visit the Borghese Gallery, Roman Forum, and Sistine Chapel in Vatican City. One afternoon Madame Garrett invited me to accompany her to an exhibit of contemporary Italian painters, where she acquired two large handsome paintings by Felice Casorati. I bought two small canvases by Massimo Campigli-three disembodied heads (like Coptic portraits), and a portrait ofhis Romanian sister-in-law. Both Madame Garrett's and my purchases were exhibited at the Embassy before our concerts. Our next official concert in Rome at the Doria Pamphili palace, sponsored by Prince Doria, attracted a most distinguished audience. We were 75 • A Fiddler's Tale very impressed to meet the celebrated composer Ottorino Respighi and his very attractive Mexican wife, also a composer. Maestro Respighi was most complimentary about our quartet's performances. For our tour, the Garretts' oversized limo carried us and all our luggage comfortably through the beautiful Italian countryside. In his smart uniform and cap, Ernesto resembled a general in a De Sica film. The effect of our quartet arriving in such an elegant limo, with Ernesto at the wheel, soon proved disadvantageous. Seeing us descend from the limo with Ernesto's aid, concierges charged us exorbitant rates. We devised a stratagem. I was appointed negotiator. Ernesto would park the limo around a corner, out ofsight. Then I would enter the hotel lobby without a jacket, hat, or tie, and request modest accommodations for traveling musicians, three rooms (one with two beds) with meals. (Paul and I shared quarters.) The tactic worked! We obtained customary tourist rates. Without exception, when the limo rolled up to unload my colleagues, instruments, and baggage with Ernesto's supervision, the concierge would clutch his head with both hands, sighing ''Mama mia!"or ''Maledizione!'' over the lost chance to raise the rates! Our Naples concert gave me a briefglimpse ofPompeii and some idea oflife in ancient Roman times. Our concerts in Milan were in the famed Teatro alIa Scala. At Parma, we performed in the Ridotto del Teatro Regio, receiving headlines in the newspaper, "Ovazione e applausoprolungato ." Before leaving the city we all visited Niccolo Paganini's tomb. In Florence we performed in the imposing grande sala of the majestic Palazzo Vecchio. Our "Musical Art Qyartetto Americano" received commemorative medals from Naples, Milan, and Parma that were presented to each member. In Venice we played in the elegant eighteenth-century Teatro la Fenice. Our concerts were all gratifying artistic and financial successes. In Turin our concert was in the Conservatorio Giuseppe Verdi. After the program, the Principessa Yolanda (nee Maria Jose) invited us to perform piano quartets in her private apartment in the Royal Palazzo. Her mother was Belgium's Qyeen Elisabeth, who had founded the International Music Competition ofBelgium to honor her violin teacher Eugene Ysay-e. The Principessa was an accomplished pianist who had studied seriously with excellent professors. She performed Mozart and Brahms piano quartets with us, and she was very musical. Then she invited Sascha and Marie to join her in a Beethoven piano trio. The small audience included her husband, Prince Umberto, other members ofthe royal family , and a few intimate friends. After this tour, my colleagues sailed to New York from Genoa. Once Italian Concerts • 77 again I used my passage fare to return to Paris via train, for I had friends among artists and art dealers awaiting me. I settled again comfortably at the Hotel de Chevreuse. The year 1931 brought a vast colonial exposition, which I found enchanting . I visited the site several times to admire the...

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