"We try, as an organization, to be absolutely catholic in taste. Nor do
we neglect the older music, because we play so much of the new. This
year we are devoting special attention to the American composers.
Formerly the Kneisels took care of them, and now we feel that we should
assume this legacy. We have already played Daniel Gregory Mason's fine
_Intermezzo_, and the other American numbers we have played include
David Stanley Smith's _Second Quartet_, and movements from quartets by
Victor Kolar and Samuel Gardner. We are also going to revive Charles
Martin Loeffler's _Rhapsodies_ for viola, oboe and piano.
"I have been for some time making a collection of sonatas _a tre_, two
violins and 'cello--delightful old things by Sammartini, Leclair, the
Englishman Boyce, Friedemann Bach and others. This is material from
which the amateur could derive real enjoyment and profit. The Leclair
sonata in D minor we have played some three hundred times; and its slow
movement is one of the most beautiful _largos_ I know of in all chamber
music. The same thing could be done in the way of transcription for
chamber music which Kreisler has already done so charmingly for the solo
violin. And I would dearly love to do it! There are certain 'primitives'
of the quartet--Johann Christian Bach, Gossec, Telemann, Michel
Haydn--who have written music full of the rarest melodic charm and
freshness. I have much excellent material laid by, but as you know,"
concluded Mr. Betti with a sigh, "one has so little time for anything in
America."