Felix Aprahamian

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 20:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety five, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:29

My Castaway this week is a music writer and critic. Now eighty, he lives in a large house in North London, surrounded by memories of the great names of twentieth century music. Poulanque peed against a tree in the front garden, Messien is a signatory to the visitor's book, and, so the story goes, Nigel Kennedy was conceived in the front room.

Presenter0:48

The man at the centre of these musical connections worked for Sir Thomas Beecham and the Sunday Times, where he was a music critic for more than forty years. His work, his knowledge, and the range of people he's known and encouraged make him one of this country's musical institutions. He is Felix

Presenter1:07

A lifetime, Felix, devoted to music and to musicians, and to this house in Muswell Hill, where you've lived practically all your life since the age of four. Presumably you could never leave it, because it's so full of these musical memories.

Felix Aprahamian1:20

Well, for purely practical reason I I couldn't leave it because it's uh it's absolutely full of books, music, things I've needed. I've always had my working tools there, you see.

Felix Aprahamian1:33

No, I'm I'm very happy with it and uh I

Presenter1:36

But describe it to me. I it's I get the impression it's almost a museum. There are so many musical treasures in it.

Felix Aprahamian1:41

It's not a museum, really. Things are locked in.

Felix Aprahamian1:44

bookcases and cupboards, but it it doesn't look so unfriendly. It is really lived in.

Presenter1:48

It is r

Presenter1:49

But you've got a huge and rather special organ in the front room, I think.

Felix Aprahamian1:53

No, you see the organ is the chamber organ that my friend Andre Marchal, the blind organist, had at his country villa in Andai, Andai Plage. When Andre Marchal died, left the villa to his housekeeper, she didn't want the organ.

Felix Aprahamian2:07

She wanted a piano because she had grandchildren who played the piano.

Felix Aprahamian2:11

So wouldn't it be nice if Felix would accept this organ? And so it happened.

Presenter2:16

And what about this tree that was watered by Poulanque? Is it true that?

Felix Aprahamian2:20

It's that's in the fr it's a plain tree in the outside.

Felix Aprahamian2:24

One day at the friend mine who's

Felix Aprahamian2:27

had gone to Evensong at Westminster Abbey, came rushing in. There was a party on. He said there's a tall man peeing against the the plane tree outside.

Felix Aprahamian2:38

I looked out and I saw it was Poulike. He thought it would be a waste of time to f go up to the first floor or to the gardener's do So did he make a habit of it? Well, certainly not. I dare I doubt if he'd have done that in the Rue de Medicis where he lived in Paris, but I suppose uh

Presenter2:53

In Maswell Hill it was okay.

Presenter2:56

What year would that have been there?

Felix Aprahamian2:58

Well, I suppose it would be forty five

Felix Aprahamian3:03

46, immediately after the official end of the war, or maybe even after the liberation of Paris, which was before the end of the war.

Presenter3:11

And is it true somebody tried to chop this tree down at some point and you said, no, no, you can't possibly do that? This is a historic monument.

Felix Aprahamian3:17

Absolutely. My private reason to uh

Felix Aprahamian3:22

Speak eloquently, perhaps, in the town hall, that the that row of plane trees should be preserved. I think it deserves a little brass plaque.

Presenter3:32

I want to talk to you a lot about your music, obviously, but but let's have some music to start with. Tell me about your first Desert Island disc.

Felix Aprahamian3:39

Well, boy and man, I've been very much bound up with the music of Frederic Dedlius.

Felix Aprahamian3:44

And my first memory of a dealer's piece was going home late one night in 19.

Felix Aprahamian3:50

Twenty-nine, and uh my mother called to me, said, You mustn't listen to this music I've been listening to on headphones, you know, crystal set and uh

Felix Aprahamian4:00

Just by chance I chanced on the final pages of Dealis's Mass of Life,

Felix Aprahamian4:07

being conducted by Sir Thomas Beacham in april nineteen twenty nine at the last concert of the Delius Festival.

Felix Aprahamian4:14

which he organised in London.

Felix Aprahamian4:18

And that was my first experience of genius.

Presenter5:40

The End of Delius' Mass of Life with the London Philharmonic Choir and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Sir Thomas Beacham. So Felix Aprahamian the Critic is a living encyclopedia of memories of twentieth century musicians, but but you might have been one yourself, I understand. You were a bit of a prodigy on the piano, is that right?

Felix Aprahamian5:59

Oh, never, never. I mean, that's when you know how bad you are, I... You performed. Oh, no, at a children's a piece you learn from the piano teacher round the corner and and you are busking one day in the in the in the ship's lounge and somebody hears and says we must play at the ship's concert and you do and you play a dreadful sixpenny piano transcription of Ake Namur from the Travatore without knowing it has a middle section and and you play it and and and a flautist adds the middle section you don't know there is a middle section and you just curl up and then when he comes in with the tune again you join in. I mean this was awful. It was the beginning of critical wisdom to know how bad you are.

Presenter6:03

Yeah.

Presenter6:45

This was en route to New York.

Felix Aprahamian6:46

Yeah, we were visiting our grandparents in nineteen twenty three.

Presenter6:51

So you decided then and there that performance was not for you, did you?

Felix Aprahamian6:54

Oh well, I suppose th they were so embarrassed. I mean, I I I have played with people in the decent privacy of one's music room. But your parents knew nothing about music.

Presenter7:04

See

Felix Aprahamian7:04

Well, my mother adored it. Indeed, it was she who got me to listen to the last bass of the Mass of Life on that memorable occasion. But to my father he could never have conceived that

Felix Aprahamian7:17

Music means a lot more than being a a brilliant performer yourself.

Presenter7:21

So where do you get it from then? Your ear for music you get from your mother, you're saying, I think so yes. But is there any mother?

Felix Aprahamian7:25

I think so, yes.

Felix Aprahamian7:27

My father liked uh Champsonier in his Paris years, but

Felix Aprahamian7:32

I think my love of music, my compulsive life of music, really is a harmonic thing.

Felix Aprahamian7:37

In other words, the instant

Felix Aprahamian7:40

spontaneous emotional appeal of music, and I think that's a harmonic thing.

Presenter7:45

Let's have record number two.

Felix Aprahamian7:46

Well, once I awoke to music.

Felix Aprahamian7:50

Probably in my last year at school.

Felix Aprahamian7:53

That was probably the cause of my uh failing my trick.

Felix Aprahamian7:57

Because I became addicted to music.

Felix Aprahamian8:00

I was taken to my first prom in nineteen thirty.

Felix Aprahamian8:04

From that time onwards I was seasoned ticket holder of the proms, thirty bob a time, stood fifty nights out of fifty one, shall we say, and that went on, by and large, till thirty nine.

Felix Aprahamian8:17

Then, of course, in those days Bax was a a popular figure at concerts at the Proms, and we heard the symphonies as they came out one by one, and and Sir Henry was devoted to Bax's music, and he was a sort of demigod for me in those days. And when I first heard

Felix Aprahamian8:36

His tintagel

Felix Aprahamian8:38

I decided I would go and see what Tintagel was like and sent him a card from Tintagel.

Felix Aprahamian8:43

and the record I knew in those days was in fact conducted by Eugene Gussens, whom I got to know in the thirties.

Felix Aprahamian8:52

and his new symphony orchestra.

Presenter9:55

Part of Arnold Bax's Tintagel, played by the new symphony orchestra conducted by Eugene Gussens. That would have been very modern music for you, Felix, written when you were perhaps about four years old, I think, and you were appreciating it, you say, in your teens, and then the Delius you had first would have been written about ten years earlier. So, as a young man, you obviously had very avant-garde taste.

Felix Aprahamian10:17

not rarely. Romantic musical tastes, neo romantic tastes. I mean, this is long before I'd heard probably a Beethoven symphony. I may have heard it in the background, was aware of it, but I I I liked the twentieth century English repertory.

Felix Aprahamian10:33

And ditto French.

Presenter10:35

Hmm.

Felix Aprahamian10:35

Repertory

Presenter10:36

But you also, of course, in your teens managed to meet some of these people who were writing. You once spent an afternoon with Delias, didn't you?

Felix Aprahamian10:44

Yes, but I mean, that again was it was an addictive thing. I didn't I realized I hadn't uh had a real musical education, you know, I hadn't been through the mill. And where would I learn music from by but but th through contact with the people who made it?

Felix Aprahamian11:00

It wasn't just a question of being an autograph hunter. The three of us were inseparable. There was Ernest Chapman, who worked at Boosey and Hawkes, D D C's publishers, and there was Donald Peart, who was uh at the Royal College of Music. He just graduated from Oxford, who we used to go to.

Felix Aprahamian11:16

contemporary music concerts together.

Felix Aprahamian11:20

Ernest had parents who lived at Saint Cloud, and the idea was we should go to Paris for the week end. We went to Saint Cloud, and on the Sunday we did the Paris churches, and on the Monday by appointment we visited Delius at Grace Horroin.

Presenter11:35

What sort of an experience was it?

Felix Aprahamian11:37

Well, I suppose it was really very wonderful. Everything centred round misses Delius. She was not at all like the Mrs. Delas portrayed in Ken Russell's film. Delius was

Felix Aprahamian11:49

Old, tired, ill.

Felix Aprahamian11:52

But, my God, he missed nothing missed absolutely nothing.

Felix Aprahamian11:58

I remember we were asked whether we'd take um tea or wine, well of course it would be wine, it came from London, and immediately he would order um a bottle of Perrier water to be cooled and the wine to be cooled, and and when it finally came, uh Mrs Dalis got some crystal glasses out of the dresser, and you hear Delis' voice saying, No, not those glasses, dear, the green glasses.

Felix Aprahamian12:25

So he missed absolutely nothing.

Presenter12:27

And did you play music?

Felix Aprahamian12:29

No, no, no, not at all. We I nearly killed him with questions. I wanted to know a lot about things. That was all very useful.

Presenter12:35

That was all

Presenter12:36

And you'd spent the previous day, if I'm not mistaken, as well as doing the Paris churches, with Vido.

Felix Aprahamian12:42

Yes, I had a card of introduction to Vidor, but he wasn't at Notre Dame.

Felix Aprahamian12:47

So we quickly went to Sansu peace.

Felix Aprahamian12:52

where, using a card addressed Shermettre to Vierne, I waved it in front of the sacristan and got admitted to the organ lot of Vidor.

Felix Aprahamian13:03

who promptly asked me to sit on the bench beside him.

Felix Aprahamian13:06

That was the best organ lesson I ever had, because he

Felix Aprahamian13:10

happened to be playing

Felix Aprahamian13:12

a piece that I'd actually been practising.

Presenter13:15

Not the Jakarta.

Felix Aprahamian13:16

No, no, not the Tacart Uneasy Piece, the Adagio from his sweet Latine.

Felix Aprahamian13:22

But it was terrific because he played it exactly as it was printed. That was a very valuable lesson.

Presenter13:28

And you were nineteen years old.

Felix Aprahamian13:30

I was nineteen.

Presenter13:31

How old would he have been?

Felix Aprahamian13:32

He was eighty nine. There was seventy years' difference between us.

Felix Aprahamian13:36

But of course you know when he was nineteen

Felix Aprahamian13:40

He knew Rossini in fact, he took part in a performance of the

Felix Aprahamian13:44

But it mes sommenel.

Felix Aprahamian13:46

And when Rossini was nineteen he probably knew Beethoven. So you see the the apostolic succession, the laying on of hands, comes through from Beethoven to Charles Marie Vidor and then then to Aprahamen.

Presenter14:00

Let's have record number three.

Felix Aprahamian14:02

Well, I went to as many concerts as I could.

Felix Aprahamian14:06

I remember

Felix Aprahamian14:07

In nineteen thirty two

Felix Aprahamian14:10

The B B C Symphony concerts at Queensor and one of the items of Sir Henry Wood's symphony concert included Maggie Tate singing Ravel's song cycle Scheherazade.

Speaker 414:31

I'm a student of faith.

Speaker 414:36

Shunny Kro Shaw.

Speaker 414:53

Uh

Presenter15:12

Maggie Tate singing L'An Differon from Ravell's Cheherazade.

Presenter15:17

So you started, um Felix Abrahamians, soaking up all this music and musicians and even at the age of seventeen I think you were writing about it for for small publications. But your father wanted you to go into business, didn't he? He didn't want you to do with this music stuff.

Felix Aprahamian15:31

Oh, no, I mean, he he thought it would be a sure way of starving.

Felix Aprahamian15:36

And uh it's great regret I have that I was never able to explain to him there were people in the music industry who uh sold music, printed music, wrapped up parcels, conducted, played flute in an orchestra. I mean there was a whole spectrum of incredible life-enhancing jobs that you could do within the sphere of music.

Presenter15:59

What job did he do, your father?

Felix Aprahamian16:01

He was Armenian, of course, and a naturalized British subject at the turn of the century. He was much older than I was, and he was in the carpet business.

Presenter16:09

What did he think you should do?

Felix Aprahamian16:11

Oh, he thought that I should get a a a job in a respectable Finchurch Street broker's office that were on the commercial sale rooms and on the metal exchange. I uh joined a an eminent firm as an office boy.

Presenter16:25

But you were bored with with m the metal exchange generally.

Felix Aprahamian16:29

Yes, I was not a that my real life began when I got the tube from bank to Oxford Circus and came to life in the c life in the concert room.

Presenter16:39

So you you turned your back on on a healthy income in in the metal business and you took a job with the London Philharmonic

Felix Aprahamian16:45

It wasn't a healthy income.

Presenter16:47

What's not?

Felix Aprahamian16:47

Oh no, it was.

Presenter16:49

But it might have been

Felix Aprahamian16:49

It was 19 shillings a week when I started in 1931.

Felix Aprahamian16:54

and went up to thirty shillings a week.

Felix Aprahamian16:58

And then I decided I shall just starve.

Felix Aprahamian17:01

And then I knew Thomas Russell, a viola player in the London Philharmonic Orchestra. We used to share a pair of press seats occasionally you know, the pseudo press, when the uh a critic wasn't eminent enough to get a whole pair of seats, sometimes if a house had to be papered.

Felix Aprahamian17:20

pair of press seats would be divided, and I'd find myself sitting next to Thomas Russell.

Felix Aprahamian17:26

And it was my friend Ernest Chapman, the one who

Felix Aprahamian17:29

It was instrumental in my going to visit Delius, uh, told Tom that I was

Felix Aprahamian17:35

wanting a job, and it had to be in music.

Felix Aprahamian17:39

So I was sent for.

Felix Aprahamian17:42

And I began working for the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

Felix Aprahamian17:46

On January first, nineteen forty.

Felix Aprahamian17:49

phony period of the war, voluntarily restricting my salary to

Felix Aprahamian17:55

three pound ten a week, which is what the air raid wardens got.

Presenter17:59

Tell me about record number four.

Presenter18:03

Yeah.

Felix Aprahamian18:03

In the thirties my experience of of music was mostly orchestral and chamber and recitals, etcetera. No opera. I'm not really an opera buff. But I think possibly on a desert island I should have at least one

Felix Aprahamian18:20

Operatic excerpt, and of course, there's no question in my mind that it would be the one opera that I would not be without.

Felix Aprahamian18:29

Palerse médeisande de Bussy.

Speaker 418:33

Uh

Speaker 418:41

O Masa Deshapir O Mil Yada Teshapur.

Speaker 419:14

Tufoi, tou foi, is a free resort for the Alema.

Speaker 419:21

You say my leave one, it's enough for good mother name!

Speaker 419:26

Oh, Jimmy Mar!

Presenter19:31

Jacques Jonsen and Irene Joachim singing the duet Jele Neu from Debussy's Pelleas et Melissande.

Presenter19:39

You started work for the Sunday Times, Felix, in 1948, and you stayed for forty, forty-one years.

Felix Aprahamian19:45

Forty one yeah.

Presenter19:45

Did you have your own rules that you wrote by when writing music criticism? After all, any any artistic criticism is is a subjective business. How did you make sure that yours was reasonably objective and interesting?

Felix Aprahamian20:01

Well, I mean I have that problem all the time.

Felix Aprahamian20:05

The uh one's reaction to the music I heard was instantly, immediately subjective, if you wish. But if you have a performer, for example, or or even a new work, then you have to say, Well, how many out of ten would I give that for melody? How many out of ten would I give that for harmony? How many out of ten for rhythm? How many out of ten for colour, orchestration?

Felix Aprahamian20:31

Somehow or other you can build up your instinctive percentage.

Presenter20:35

But how hard should we, the ordinary listener, have to work at enjoying a piece of music? Because we're frequently told these days, particularly where modern music is concerned, that it is our shortcoming if we don't like it, if we haven't got there to appre far enough to appreciate it.

Felix Aprahamian20:52

With respect, I think that's rubbish.

Felix Aprahamian20:55

Your instinctive reaction to a piece of music must be emotional and subjective.

Felix Aprahamian21:03

To get to know a lot more about it will help.

Felix Aprahamian21:06

The more you know about a piece of music it does it won't spoil its enjoyment of that piece of music.

Felix Aprahamian21:12

But that's a secondary thing.

Felix Aprahamian21:14

I mean, you see, the music appeals to the heart, first of all.

Felix Aprahamian21:18

Then it appeals to the head, the intellectual content of it, and to the feet, there must be a dance element in it, and perhaps for something that lies between the feet and the heart, the sex.

Felix Aprahamian21:30

Now, for example.

Felix Aprahamian21:32

After Delius, I could come right out and say my favourite composer is Bach.

Felix Aprahamian21:39

There is a man who appeals to the head, the heart, and the feet. No sex in the music.

Felix Aprahamian21:45

But obviously it's going to help you appreciate Bach if you know how how it's all put together.

Felix Aprahamian21:52

But the instant appeal must be emotional, first of all.

Presenter21:58

Next piece of music.

Presenter22:00

Talking about emotion.

Felix Aprahamian22:02

Well, let me indulge myself further in this sort of morass of neo romantic, self indulgent music. Recording to day

Felix Aprahamian22:13

This is what I feel. It is quite possible that in a fortnight's time, although three or four of those disks would remain permanently

Felix Aprahamian22:22

There are others which I'm perhaps even besotted with for a short period.

Felix Aprahamian22:28

This happened to me quite recently. It was Rachmaninoff's Second Symphony. I knew it. I had many recordings of it. Now, I suppose in the last fortnight I must have heard this a dozen times. If you were to remove me to a desert island to morrow, I'd insist on taking that record with me.

Felix Aprahamian22:46

But don't write me down as a musical degenerate, because it happens to me my desert island disc choice today.

Presenter23:46

Part of Rachmaninoff's Symphony No. Two in E minor, played by the BBC Philharmonic, conducted by Edward Downes.

Presenter23:53

Is there a modern day composer, a contemporary composer, who moves you at all, Felix?

Felix Aprahamian24:00

Oh, yes, plenty.

Felix Aprahamian24:02

But the question is whether I would take them to the desert island with me.

Presenter24:06

But do you enjoy the music of Harry Burt Whistle and Peter Maxwell Davis?

Presenter24:11

Doesn't sound as if it's your kind of music.

Felix Aprahamian24:14

No. One or two of Max's pieces, Very Late, that I enjoy.

Presenter24:19

But if I can quote you to yourself, you said that

Presenter24:22

After the war composers all started wearing the same drab raincoats and became boring.

Presenter24:28

What do you mean by that and why? Do you think that I mean

Felix Aprahamian24:30

I mean the post-war composers write wrote if you wish eight tone on or twelve tone music. You couldn't identify the composers.

Felix Aprahamian24:40

Whereas the composers of the school that I'm interested in, the the school, the Golden Age, as it were, whether it's English music or French music, which is really the fif first fifty years of this our own century.

Felix Aprahamian24:53

They wore not only their nationality,

Felix Aprahamian24:56

but their musical heart on their sleeve and they were instantly identifiable.

Presenter25:02

But those people who like contemporary music, like Burt Whistle and Maxwell Davis, would say that you're simply old fashioned, that you're anti-avant-garde.

Felix Aprahamian25:10

No, I'm not anti-avant-garde. I go a second time to hear them. I stick my neck out. I have no hand.

Presenter25:15

So you work quite hard at them.

Felix Aprahamian25:18

Well, no, I went to hear uh Max's Saint Michael Sonata, the Cheltenham Sonata, commissioned by Cheltenham, and I thought it was I didn't care for it very much at the time, and I said so. Twenty five years later it was repeated at the Cheltenham Festival as one of their early commissions, and I thought now

Felix Aprahamian25:38

Uh Felix, this is your opportunity to go and show that you have learnt something.

Felix Aprahamian25:44

Do you know, it sounded even worse the second performance, twenty five years after, than it did previously. So I'm not rushing on the bandwagon.

Presenter25:52

Well, is thou is that I mean that's the point really is that your shortcoming or is that the shortcoming of the music?

Felix Aprahamian25:58

Well, I won't be so boastful as to say it's shortcoming of the musical. I'll take bets that quite a number of these music I mean, I of course there'll be there'll be individual pieces which will be played.

Presenter26:06

Yeah.

Felix Aprahamian26:09

There there are pieces of Schoenberg which will be played.

Presenter26:13

But you don't think that the bulk of it will last in the way that the music of Rachmaninoff or Tchaikovsky will last?

Presenter26:19

Fair.

Felix Aprahamian26:20

I'm good.

Presenter26:20

Go.

Presenter26:21

Record number six.

Felix Aprahamian26:24

At the time I discovered music, I also discovered the possibility of the organ as a musical instrument.

Felix Aprahamian26:30

And of course there, I mean absolute God the father of music is Johann Sebastian Bach.

Speaker 226:32

Yeah.

Felix Aprahamian26:35

My love of organ music brought me into contact, as I've said, with Andre Marshal, whose organ I've inherited at Mussel Hill. And he has recorded the

Felix Aprahamian26:45

a little organ book, the Ogelbuchline of Bach, and here's a simple page, the choral prelude, Chris der Einger Gottesh.

Felix Aprahamian26:56

and recorded by Marshall on one of his favourite instruments, the that in the Grossminster at Zurich.

Presenter28:01

That was Bach's choral prelude Christ der Einige Gottessohn played by André Marchal.

Presenter28:06

There's no popular music in these choices, Felix, but you apparently have a soft spot for Gershwin and for shearing, is that right?

Felix Aprahamian28:14

Oh yes, but not for sound pollution.

Presenter28:16

What sound pollution?

Felix Aprahamian28:17

But you know.

Presenter28:19

Pop music

Felix Aprahamian28:20

Yeah, of course.

Presenter28:20

Any pop music?

Felix Aprahamian28:21

No, I mean I I for my personal pleasure I play records by uh George Shearing, Stephan Grapelli.

Presenter28:29

But you don't think modern popular music has anything to commend it at all?

Felix Aprahamian28:33

Not me, no, I stop with the Beatles or Pre-Beatles.

Presenter28:36

But there are people and quite serious music critics who would acknowledge that that the Beatles will go down in history as a great landmark, a great turning point in the history of Western popular music. Do you would you not give them that?

Felix Aprahamian28:48

I suppose they would when there's been popular music, popular music. I think it'll.

Felix Aprahamian28:53

Uh and I don't want to sound snobbish about this at all, but it it's it doesn't get me.

Presenter28:58

But do you think the Beatles are overrated?

Felix Aprahamian29:03

Probably not at the time.

Felix Aprahamian29:06

For example, take a work of Benjamin Britton.

Felix Aprahamian29:10

Everybody went mad about the War Requim. It's a marvellous work.

Felix Aprahamian29:15

whereas another work with the same sentiments by Delius failed in the twenties.

Felix Aprahamian29:21

It may be that in two hundred years' time

Felix Aprahamian29:24

There will be more performances Delas' Requiem.

Felix Aprahamian29:28

Than of Britons war equim.

Felix Aprahamian29:31

These are tracts for the times.

Felix Aprahamian29:34

And they may be fashionable.

Felix Aprahamian29:36

Tracts for a certain time.

Felix Aprahamian29:39

But I'm not going to put my neck out and say, yes, it is like this today, and it will always be so.

Presenter29:46

But it's interesting that your musical choice is practically I think all of it except for the notable exception of Bach, the other seven are all from the first thirty years of this century. We're all written in the first thirty seven.

Felix Aprahamian29:58

Because when I was blessed, that's when I came to life.

Felix Aprahamian30:01

So in in that sense I do reflect.

Felix Aprahamian30:05

My age, not necessarily my parents' age, my own age. I grew up when Bax was writing his music.

Felix Aprahamian30:12

Rabel was alive.

Felix Aprahamian30:14

Dobusi has was recently well, he was alive when I was alive.

Felix Aprahamian30:19

And Poolang too. We have a song by Poolang.

Felix Aprahamian30:22

He was one of those artists who with Bernache

Felix Aprahamian30:26

was just known in London before the war, but the platform at the Wigmore Hall was a useful way of their returning to their London audience. And on hi at his first concert with Bernach post-war concert, he sang this extraordinarily moving song, C, words by Louis Aragon.

Felix Aprahamian30:46

And uh

Felix Aprahamian30:48

There was hardly a a dry eye in the house when this was sung at Wigmore Hall after the war years.

Speaker 431:02

Son Law

Felix Aprahamian31:02

Fun law.

Speaker 431:05

Good to the conceivable

Speaker 431:33

Not for the siren

Presenter31:57

Pierre Bernac singing C, composed and accompanied by Francis Poulanc. What do you do in Muswell Hill these days, Felix? Are the the musical people and the comings and goings as numerous as ever?

Felix Aprahamian32:10

I I work, I uh do sleeve notes, I prepare B B C scripts when I'm asked to do so.

Presenter32:16

Hello.

Felix Aprahamian32:18

I read quite a bit, one way or another.

Presenter32:21

I I read a story of your unearthing not long ago a a Bartock score which had been amended by the composer himself. I wonder how much you worry that you have more hidden treasures buried among your papers that only you can identify.

Felix Aprahamian32:36

Oh, I'm cataloging gradually. I mean, long before writing the

Felix Aprahamian32:41

autobiography for which I've had a contract in the last for the last fifteen years, I'm too busy uh living my daily life instead of worrying about setting it down. The stuff I've got in the house, I'm more concerned that it goes to a right the right place.

Felix Aprahamian32:58

Which is? Well, I'm I'm making my mind up. You must never give it away.

Presenter33:03

What about you on your desert island? What are you going to do? I mean, there's no piano, there's uh no music, only your wind up gramophone and these eight records.

Felix Aprahamian33:12

Well, I should probably read. I'm allowed uh what did you say, the Shakespeare, the Bible? Uh

Presenter33:16

Uh-huh.

Felix Aprahamian33:17

And one other book.

Speaker 433:18

Mm-hmm.

Felix Aprahamian33:18

Well proof.

Felix Aprahamian33:20

And I rechest du tempel dieu.

Felix Aprahamian33:22

It takes a long time to read through.

Felix Aprahamian33:25

You don't have to read anything else really.

Presenter33:27

So you'll read and you'll listen to your music and you'll be entirely happy, will you?

Felix Aprahamian33:31

I don't know. I think I would be quite happy. It would be time to not uh have to listen to music I didn't want to listen to or to r read things I didn't want to read. I mean, that goes for present day papers. For years I it's down to only two periodicals.

Felix Aprahamian33:50

Private eye

Felix Aprahamian33:51

And Word of World of the Interior.

Felix Aprahamian33:56

Oh, I I don't even take those. Cuttings are are brought to me every day.

Felix Aprahamian34:02

Sometimes two or three of the same cutting. People know what I will collect.

Presenter34:06

Tell me about your last record.

Felix Aprahamian34:09

My last record well, I was going to suggest the last record should be the opening of Deanus's Mass of Life. I began my musical career, as it were, with listening to Beecham,

Felix Aprahamian34:21

at that incredible D'S Festival he organized in nineteen twenty nine, and a recording he made in the thirties. But recently a record has come out, a C D, with Norm Del Mar conducting.

Felix Aprahamian34:36

I was present at this performance, and I was sitting next to Eric Femby, dealing his ammanuensis.

Felix Aprahamian34:43

And immediately the first movement was over, we turned round to each other and spontaneously

Felix Aprahamian34:49

We said

Felix Aprahamian34:50

The best since Beecham

Presenter35:54

The opening of Delia's Massive Life with the B B C Chorus and Symphony Orchestra conducted by Norman Del Mar. Well, now, if you could only take one of those eight records, Felix.

Felix Aprahamian36:04

Oh, I think it would be the bach. Something absolutely pure and absolute music.

Felix Aprahamian36:09

and and something one could never tire of.

Presenter36:13

And what about your luxury?

Felix Aprahamian36:15

Well, I carry that with me, a Swiss army knife.

Felix Aprahamian36:18

with all the various prongs, you know, I could c trim my nails, trim a beard, I could peel fruit, uh

Felix Aprahamian36:27

Not for any design of escaping or building a raft or anything, but simply as a

Felix Aprahamian36:33

A rather civilised thing to have with me.

Presenter36:36

Felix Abrahamian, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs.

Felix Aprahamian36:41

Thank you.

Speaker 236:50

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.