Up from the Basement

The three foreign-born piano teachers were only casual acquaintances in Europe, and they had not met in the U.S. until they happened together in the basement of Manhattan's Steinway Hall. Pint-sized, Polish-born Adam Garner just happened to have a copy of Bach's Concerto for Four Claviers and Orchestra. Young, Illinois-born Edward Edson, who was roaming the basement trying to select a piano, was willing to sit in as a fourth. So they maneuvered four concert grands into position, and gave the Bach a try.

That was nine years ago. Since then, the First Piano Quartet has crisscrossed the U.S. on concert tours, made dozens of recordings for RCA Victor (their Chopin Favorites album is No. 3 bestseller among classical albums), was co-winner of this year's Musical America award for the best instrumental ensemble on the air and helped NBC win the Peabody award for "good music." Last week, the First Piano

Quartet finally got around to its first Carnegie Hall concert.

In the Mood. Manhattan concertgoers were just in the mood for what the quartet had to offer. (Says one quartet member: "You wait four hours at the opera for the Liebestod; we give it to them right off the bat.") And when the four boys had romped cleanly and lightly through their special arrangements of such numbers as Schubert's Impromptu in B-flat Major, the finale of Prokofiev's Classical Symphony, the first movement of Bach's Concerto in D Minor and some Chopin etudes --one to show that four pianos can ripple as fast as one--the near-sellout audience thumped their hands for more.

All four of the pianists do the arranging. Each keeps in mind the special talents of the other three. Russian-born Vladimir ("Vee") Padwa, who filled a vacancy in the Quartet in 1942, is the trill expert; Garner likes to handle special tonal colors; Edson is famed for what the others call his "light delicate touch." Viennese Frank Mittler, who looks like a concert version of Actor Frank Fay, quips: "I do the 'dramatic pauses.' "

Discords in the Wings. All four (average age: "near 35") are married, and even their wives and kids get along harmoniously. There is a "fifth member" of the quartet, who, as far as the playing members are concerned, is currently making discords in the wings. Since January, the pianists have been trying to get out of their contracts with Manager Edwin Fadiman (Clifton's brother), who, they claim, gets too big a cut of the receipts. The receipts were nothing to trifle with; last year the quartet made close to $240,000 in concert tours, radio and recordings.

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