Theodor Leschetizky, Ethel Leginska's teacher, was a real power in
that period, being generally considered the premier educator for
gifted young'uns.  You'll recall his rejection of Paderewski as "not
housebroken" and woefully deficient in technique.  Also he could come
up with the ultimate put-down, viz:  to the young Franz Schmidt, who
was sent to study with him:  "you are not housebroken, and indeed,
anyone with a name like Franz Schmidt has no hope of a concert career."
In both cases, he proved to be wrong, and admitted it in later years.

I am actually writing principally to urge our dedicated roll-scanners
to consider the possibility of transferring the expression codes from
Angelus to, say, Ampico or Duo-Art, so that the rolls could be enjoyed
by others.  I believe Tom Jansen of Monschau could do this, were he to
find the time and wish to.  Others wanting to do a similar job have
plenty of material on which to work, not only Angelus, but other
interesting labels as well.

Primary among them (other than those mentioned) would be the rolls
produced by Philips on DUCA, a recent discovery and one which has
intrigued Tom Jansen.  He was fortunate enough to find several owners
in Germany, with quite a few rolls and even was able to purchase a fine
example of a "cabinet piano" very popular in the first decade of the
last century.  Reports from Monschau have indicated that this Feurich
piano is a fine example of that artistry and when completely adjusted
to its maximum will indeed be suitable for recording.

The DUCA catalog contains many hundreds of splendid recordings by many
of the artists who performed for other labels.  I hope to add detail of
this company in an upcoming edition of The Reproducing Piano Roll
Foundation, http://www.rprf.org/

I'd be pleased to have comments and suggestions on the information about
Artrio-Angelus, and indeed on the notion of transfer of expression codes
in general.

Albert M. Petrak, Founder
The Reproducing Piano Roll Foundation