The Icelandic Canadian - 01.06.1967, Page 79

THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
/ /
JONAS PALSSON
by DOROTHY GARBUTT
The other evening I saw a film call-
ed “Carnegie Hall”. It was full of ho-
kum and what Meredith Willson calls
“long hairs”. The story was sentiment-
al and inconsequential, serving only
to bring the foremost musicians in Am-
merica before the camera in their best
loved performances.
And as I sat and watched the really
marvellous close-ups of the maestros,
the unbelievable dexterity of the artists
and the profound charm of Lily Pons
and Rise Stevens, the two glamor gals
of the opera, my mind went back to
the one real musician I had known in
my life.
I don’t know that he was famous in
any way, but he had a local pre-emin-
ence, and parents who wanted their
children to have the best in music
made sure that he was their teacher.
His name was Jonas Palsson; he lived
on Wictor street, for that was how he
pronounced it and how I still think of
it, and he was born in Iceland. He was
short and stocky and of a thoroughly
musicianly appearance. His hands were
square, the fingers surprisingly short
and spatulate. Surprisingly so, because
they could span chords and skip
around the keyboard, reaching notes
at either end with such lightning speed
that they seemed almost to be joined
by little finger and thumb.
■k ★
Jonas Palsson
He was very strict and insisted on
the hands being held just so, at such
an angle that all the latent power and
nimbleness of the 'fingers were at the
command of each particular note. And
the scales . . . oh, the scales! First of
all, for the initiate, there was the
Gustav Damn (you should pardon the
expression) exercise book. I loved it,
for it had excitingly brief five-finger
exercises 'that cleverly led up to tune-
ful little airs, comprising the very
graceful notes and pizziccatos just
practised. The melodies were nearly
all German Volklieder, pretty little
folk songs such as “Du, Du, Liegst Mir
Im Herzen” (which by the way, has
just become popular with almost the
very same words in English), or “In
Einem Kuhlen Grunde,” not to men-