Sidney Weiss is an American violinist, teacher, and conductor born (in
Chicago) on June 28, 1928. There is not too much information about him on the internet. He is best
known as one of the former concertmasters of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He is also known for making violins, although
I don’t know how many he has constructed.
I don’t know at what age he began studying but I do know he later
studied at the Chicago Musical College.
Later still he attended De Paul University (Chicago.) From 1956 to 1966 he played in the Cleveland
Orchestra – in the first violins but I don’t know how far up. He was 28 years old when he joined. George Szell was the conductor back then. From 1967 to 1972 he was concertmaster of the
Chicago Symphony. He then left for
Europe with his pianist wife and toured Europe with her as the Weiss Duo while
also serving as concertmaster of the Monte Carlo Philharmonic (the Orchestra of
the Monte Carlo Opera) between 1972 and 1978.
In 1979 he came to play with the Los Angeles Philharmonic as
concertmaster. He remained until his
abrupt departure in early May, 1994. He soloed with the orchestra on several occasions, one being April 15, 1981 (with the Sibelius concerto and Simon Rattle - before he became a very famous conductor - on the podium) and another on March 21, 1991 (featuring the Korngold concerto, Lawrence Foster conducting.) Among other
orchestras, he has conducted the Glendale Symphony (1997-2001) and participated in numerous
recording sessions in Los Angeles as well as undertaken tours as the violinist
with the Weiss Duo. You can find a few
of his recordings here. Sample sound
files are available here and here. One
of them is of the Mendelssohn concerto for violin and piano, a seldom heard
work. As far as I know, his best-known
pupil is Armen Anassian.
Johann Stamitz (Johann Wenzel Anton Stamitz) was a Czech violinist,
conductor, and composer born (in Deutschbrod, Bohemia) on June 18, 1717. He is remembered as the concertmaster of the
famous Mannheim Court Orchestra and father of two composers, Carl and
Anton. He has been called the “missing
link” between Bach and Haydn. Not too
much is known of his early life. In
1734, he attended the University of Prague but left after a year. He then traveled as a touring violin virtuoso
though little is known about where he went.
Then, in 1741 (or 1742) he was appointed to the Mannheim Orchestra. He was 24 years old. He soon became the concertmaster and leader
of the orchestra (1745), which he brought to a high degree of excellence, so
much so that it has been said that it was the finest in Europe. It was said in England that Stamitz’ orchestra
consisted of “an army of generals.” He
visited Paris in 1754 and performed (in September of 1754) at the Concerts
Spirituel, a well-known concert series which attracted much attention in those
days. He also put out some music through
French publishers. However, his music
was also published in England and the Netherlands. After returning to Mannheim in 1755, he died
two years later, on March 27, 1757. He
was barely 39 years old and Mozart was a one-year-old child. Stamitz is credited with having expanded the
role of wind instruments in symphonies as well as establishing the
four-movement form. These innovations
were later further developed by better-known composers such as Joseph Haydn,
Wolfgang Mozart, and Ludwig Beethoven.
Stamitz may have composed as many as 75 symphonies (the real number is
not known), 10 trios, 12 flute concertos, 2 harpsichord concertos, 14 violin
concertos, and a large amount of chamber music.
You can listen to one of his violin concertos here and one of his very
difficult trumpet concertos can be heard here.
Lee Actor is an American
violinist, composer, and conductor with an unfolding career as a very
successful composer, a career which almost happened as a second thought. He is also an electrical engineer and has
worked for years in the Information Technology field as well as the video game
industry. The dual endeavors are not as
far apart as many would imagine – not nearly.
Music and Science – especially mathematics – are intimately
intertwined. Actor’s engineering degrees
are from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (1970-1975, Troy, New York, about 150
miles north of New York City), one of the top science schools in the
country. Simultaneously studying music
and science, he chose to pursue science upon graduation and worked at GTE in
Boston for several years. One of his
violin professors was Angelo Frascarelli.
Although he began violin studies at age 7, kept up his pursuit of music
studies at Rensselaer, played violin and viola in the Albany (New York)
Symphony for three years (1972-1975), Actor also devoted time to composition. While working full-time, he studied
conducting privately with David Epstein at MIT (Boston, 1975-1978) and composition
with Donald Sur. Up until 1978, Actor
was playing violin in various orchestras on a regular basis and was composing chamber music works in his spare time. Three
years later (1979), he found himself in Silicon Valley (California), working in
the IT field but taking advanced courses in music as well.
While there, Actor secured his Master’s degree in composition from San
Jose State University (1982) and pursued further studies at the University of
California at Berkeley. In 1982, Actor
went to work for a start-up video game company. The industry was in its infancy. That led to his starting his own video game development company in 1988. In 1997, he was one of three founders of
Universal Digital Arts, a subsidiary of Universal Studios. Finally, in 2000, he went to work as Director
of Engineering for yet another high-tech start-up and retired from the industry one year
later. All this time, music had never been far
away. It is interesting that several famous musicians in history have had other careers, almost simultaneously
as they were playing or writing music – Jean-Marie Leclair, Charles Dancla,
Pierre Baillot, Alexander Borodin, Modest Mussorgsky, Ignace Paderewski,
Camille Saint Saens, Charles Ives, and Efrem Zimbalist come to mind. In 2001, Actor was invited to fill the
Assistant Conductor post with the Palo Alto Symphony. However, Actor had already been conducting
various orchestras since 1974. He was
later (2002) appointed Composer-in-Residence of the same orchestra and thus
began to compose prolifically. As far as
I know, Actor does not devote much time to small-scale works. Every review of his orchestral music
consistently praises his skills, originality, and ingenuity as a composer. Actor has mostly put the violin aside – as
have Alan Gilbert, Lorin Maazel, David Zinman, Jap Van Zweden, and a few other
violinists – in favor of other pursuits in music, composition and
conductng. English violinist Leonard
Salzedo used to play violin in the Royal Philharmonic (UK) and actually
continued playing in that orchestra for quite some time while devoting a lot of
his spare time to composition – mostly ballet music. That, however, is rare. Other violinists who turned from playing to
other endeavors include Theodore Thomas, Victor Young, Eddy Brown, Patricia
Travers, Iso Briselli, Pierre Monteux, Joseph Achron, Eugene Ormandy, and
Arthur Judson. Actor has composed
concertos for horn, alto saxophone, timpani, guitar, and violin, as well as
various orchestral works, including two symphonies, and most of his works have
already been recorded as well, by both European and American orchestras. It is an enviable record for someone “new” to
the composition scene, so to speak. A
typical comment from a critic reads: “[the work] is an incredible tour de
force, written by an immensely talented composer.” About his violin concerto, Pip Clarke (the
English violinist for whom it was written), says “The music is exciting,
passionate, and highly romantic,...filled with beautiful melodies and writing
throughout.” At a time when most music
schools here and abroad shun melody, structure, and tonality, Actor is a true
iconoclast. A video of his Horn Concerto
can be found here. As Bronislaw Huberman
always said, the true test of permanence in art has always been audience
acceptance and Lee Actor has tons of it to spare. It’s actually a very good thing that he
turned from violin playing to composition.
One of my next blogs will focus on his violin concerto.
