Included in the Sykes collection are a number of slides of paintings. Most were photographed from the originals. This one may be a copy of a copy. If I have read the signature correctly, the artist was Alice C. Holland, and the date 1949. I had no luck finding her on the net but I did only the most basic of searches, which is by now often enough. The painting shows considerable skill. I also searched for portraits of Franz Schubert but did not find this one. Still it seems like this likeness was adapted from one of the most oft reproduce portraits of Schubert. Busts for many admired composers were often purchased for setting on the family’s piano. I have one of Bach on mine. I am pleased with Horace that he would care so for this composer who although he died young was still prolific and the most lyric of the romantics. Both his songs and sonatas will reward a lifetime of listening, and his symphonies are at once inventive and restrained. Some of his arranging for brass has riffs that sounded like jazz – sort of. We may now imagine Horace Sykes listening to Schubert serenades in his sun room with his orchids