Accompanist

If you didn't see the wide smile on her face, you might suspect this Polish singer of severe diva-itis. But she's just having fun, and, come to think of it, she's really not even stretching the truth too far in the process. With a 3 1/2 -octave range that stretches from baritonal depths up to a high mezzo's rarefied realm, Podles boasts one of the rarest and most visceral of voice types - the true contralto. But that's just the beginning. Add in a stunningly rich sound, agility to sail through the elaborately ornamented style of coloratura singing, and a wonderfully extroverted personality, and you've got what pianist (and occasional Podles accompanist)

Helen M. Egan, who played musical accompaniment for silent movies during the 1920s in her native Pennsylvania, died Wednesday of heart failure at her Timonium home. She was 91. As a youth growing up in the coal country of northeastern Pennsylvania, Mrs. Egan, a violinist, and her pianist sister provided musical background for silent movies in theaters in the Pottsville, Pa., area, before the advent of Vitaphone talking pictures in 1927. Born Helen McCann in New Boston, Pa., she was raised in St. Clair, Pa., where she attended public schools and a business school.

It doesn't take a genius to see that in the crazy world of World War II, the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans, which is the difficulty with "The Accompanist." The movie, which opens today at the Senator, is a hill of beans.A plush French melodrama from Claude Miller, it's about people who live in expensive apartments and have refined tastes and are quite irritated by the hubbub the war is causing outside the window. I mean, how could it? How dare it? It's bad enough the Germans have absolutely no fashion sense, but it's become really hard to get brandy from the provinces.

Violinist Midori stood on the stage at Peabody's Friedberg Concert Hall, slender, youthful and completely focused on the music she was creating. Just behind her, Robert McDonald sat at a grand piano. The program the duo performed last fall included Mozart's Sonata in A Major and Franck's Sonata in A Major; the music made by each performer fit together like tightly clasped hands. Midori's playing was first fiery then serene then fiery again. McDonald's piano music filled and shaped the spaces between the violinist's notes.

Had anyone had told me 40 years ago that Mieczyslaw Horszowski would become one of the world's hottest pianists, I would have laughed.But I wasn't laughing in the 1990-1991 concert season -- I was just trying to find a ticket to his Carnegie Hall recital, which had been sold out months in advance. In that season -- his last, as it turned out -- the 98-year-old Horszowski's only competition in the pianist-everyone-wants- to-hear sweepstakes was the 18-year-old Russian phenom- enon, Evgeny Kissin.

Annapolis Summer Garden Theater. Gershwin's Crazy for You. 7 p.m. Saturday and 7 p.m. Monday at Belvedere Elementary School in Arnold. Needed are mature teen and adult performers. Prepare a song, preferably from the show, and bring sheet music; accompanist will be provided. Show dates are May 24-June 22. Call 410-268-9212.

* Russian-born author Nina Nikolaevna Berberova, 82, who left her homeland in 1922 and returned decades later as an American citizen, died Sunday in Philadelphia. Her writings include her autobiography. Her writings include her autobiography, "The Italics Are Mine"; a 1937 biography of Tchaikovsky; a play, "Madame"; and a novel, "The Accompanist."