When the musical historian of the future writes his Chronicle of Twentieth Century Musical trends, he will surely head one chapter in that sombre document “The Undeniable Popularity of the Piano Concerto.” He will also have something to say about the String Orchestra, that melodious, economic, and scholarly medium through which so many players and conductors have lately reached their public. Then the thought must occur to him that it was indeed strange that the union of these picturesque and profitable activities should have been so relatively barren in result. “Where,” he will ask, “was a suitable piece of work for ‘after the interval’; for the second appearance of the visiting solo pianist who has already given his Bach or his Mozart (not without a recurrent pang of regret that Mozart's seldom-granted permission to dispense with oboes and horns has been gratefully acknowledged by the string-orchestral conductor), and who would rejoice to give his audience further evidence of his ability?” Works for piano and string orchestra which can fill this bill are surprisingly few; suitable contemporary British ones are almost unheard-of. Those which are at present available tend to fall into two categories: the spare, neo-classic concerto grosso, with keyboard part “apt for pianoforte or harpsichord,” and the mock-Rachmaninoff, with the piano “fat and well-liking,” bulging grossly over a collar of string-tone which in itself cannot nearly rise to adequate heights of sumptuousness.