Archives for November 15, 2017

“The Telephone Hour,” a 1945 short featuring Josef Hofmann, Donald Voorhees, and the Bell Telephone Orchestra. In this promotional film, produced by Leslie Roush and based on a Bell Telephone Hour radio broadcast, Hofmann performs Rachmaninoff’s C-Sharp Minor Prelude and an abridged version of the finale of Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto. This short, made on July 30, 1945, is thought to be the only surviving sound film of Hofmann in performance:

(This is the latest in a series of arts-related videos that appear in this space each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)

“What is divine in man is elusive and impalpable, and he is easily tempted to embody it in a concrete form—a church, a country, a social system, a leader—so that he may realize it with less effort and serve it with more profit. Yet the attempt to externalize the kingdom of heaven in a temporal shape must end in disaster. It cannot be created by charters or constitutions nor established by arms. Those who seek for it alone will reach it together, and those who seek it in company will perish by themselves.”

Hugh Kingsmill, The Poisoned Crown