JAVS Summer 1997

69

recounted his career as a violist in his memoir, Strings to My Bow, published in 1994. In recent years he continued to make music, with his wife Jean at the piano, until well into his eighties. He was an avid reader and during the twelve months before his death was reading Churchill's History of the Second World ~r. There will be a special tribute to Watson Forbes during the XXVI International Viola Congress in Glasgow in July 1998.

Forbes became professor of chamber music and viola at the Royal Academy and helped launch both the Alberni (of which I was the violist) and Lindsay String quartets. In the midsixties he made a major career change when he accepted the position of Head of Music for BBC Scotland, which was described as "an inspired appointment." Amongst his innovations was a BBC Viola Competition in Glasgow when the adjudica tors were Gwynne Edwards, Frederick Riddle, and for the final, William Primrose. Watson Forbes was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Glasgow. He T he spring of 1997 held considerable viola interest for residents of the Los Angeles basin, one main focus being two remarkably similar viola-piano recitals. Both were beauti fully presented by young female artists (in their twenties), representatives of major American orchestras, and both were assisted by artist-level male accompanists. Both recitals took place in small, neighborhood church settings, with enthusiastic and ample audiences, which repaired, immediately after the last encore died away, to a fellowship hall for abundant refreshments and socializing. The first recital was given on May 17 by Leticia Oaks Strong, who joined the viola sec tion of the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1994 as its youngest member. Her collaborator at the piano was Robert Thies, who did an espe cially sensitive and technically fluent job with the F-minor Brahms Sonata. The concert was presented at the chapel of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on the east edge of Pasadena. The regular program ended with an effective transcription of an attractive Latin character piece, Requiebros, by Gaspar Cassada, originally for cello and piano. Her encore was Girl with the Flaxen Hair by Debussy, which was, indeed, self-descriptive. The second of these recitals was pre sented 21 June at the West Los Angeles United Methodist Church, whose congrega tion is mostly Japanese, by Lembi Veskimets, who will join the viola section of the

John White Royal Academy of Music, London

Cleveland Orchestra in September. Her pianist was Eric Charnofsky, whose special interest in accompanying was immediately apparent. This was a benefit concert for the church's Commission on Worship. Mr. Charnofsky, formerly organist at the church, was clearly a favorite with the audience. Currently he is on the theory and accompa nying faculty of the Cleveland Institute. Miss Veskimets, born in Canada to Estonian par ents, was a student of Robert Vernon at the Cleveland Institute. Her program included the Capriccio for solo viola by Henri Vieuxtemps, a work new to this listener. It's not at all capricious in spirit, but serious, and dour. The Veskimets-Chamofsky collab oration was outstandingly successful in the "Rasch" movement of the Miirchenbilder by Schumann, where great clarity was achieved in a movement that is often just a muddle. The encore for this attractive program was a transcription by John Newton of the vocalise etude Habanera by Ravel, a work that really lends itself to the medium. The next day, June 22, in Studio City, at the Unitarian Universal Church, a new group called The Los Angeles Viola Quartet gave its first public concert. The setting was woodsy, old San Fernando Valley-not new, glassy, or air-conditioned-with a high ceiling, fans turning slowly and silently, and wonderful acoustics. The quartet consists of four women: Alexis Carreon, Dee Dee Paakkari,