Adele Anthony is an
Australian violinist and teacher born (in Tasmania) on October 1, 1970. She is known for having won first prize in the
(fifth) Carl Nielsen violin competition in 1996 (at age 25) and for being the
wife of Gil Shaham, with whom she frequently performs. Twelve years before that, at age 13, she had
won the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Instrumental Competition – she
played the Sibelius concerto on that occasion.
Soon afterward, she played the Tchaikovsky concerto in a concert
sponsored by the same organization. That
concert in 1983 is considered her Australian public debut. Anthony began her violin studies at age
3. She studied at the University of
Adelaide with Beryl Kimber. In 1987, she
came to the U.S. to pursue further study at Juilliard (New York City) where her
main teachers were Hyo Kang, Felix Galimir, and Dorothy Delay. According to one source, she studied at
Juilliard for eight years, having received funding from several benefactors, including
the Starling Foundation. However, she
was an active concert artist even while she was still at Juilliard and still
maintains a very active solo concert career.
Her repertoire is very extensive and includes all of the standard violin
literature in addition to many contemporary works less frequently heard by
audiences. As do almost all concert
violinists nowadays, Anthony also plays chamber music at various festivals
throughout the world, but especially in New York, where she resides. She has recorded for various labels and among
her notable recordings are those featuring violin concertos by Carl Nielsen, Ross
Edwards, and Nicolo Paganini. Anthony
plays a Stradivarius violin constructed in 1728. Here is one of her YouTube audio files featuring
the work of Ross Edwards – a refreshing and unusual new work for the violin. A few Stradivarius violins (perhaps one
hundred or so) have been given names which have remained attached to the
instruments for many years but – as far as I know – this one has no specific
name. I have heard it up close a number
of times and it has a wonderful sound. Perhaps
later on, it will be known as the Anthony Stradivarius.
Elizabeth
Wallfisch (Elizabeth Coates Hunt Wallfisch) is an Australian violinist,
teacher, author, and conductor born (in Melbourne, Australia) on January 28,
1952. The greater part of her career has
been spent outside of Australia. Together
with Simon Standage, Fabio Biondi, Andrew Manze, Giuliano Carmignola, Rachel Podger,
and Enrico Onofri, she is one of the better-known proponents of historical
baroque performance practice, a movement which started in the mid-1970s. Nevertheless, besides playing on baroque (period)
violins, Wallfisch also gives concerts on modern instruments. (The photo shows her holding a baroque
violin.) One of her many recordings is
the one featuring the rarely-heard Rosary Sonatas by Heinrich Biber. Another is the Opus 3 concertos (published in
1733) by Pietro Locatelli. Although she began studying piano at age 4, she did
not begin violin lessons until age 10, a rather late age at which to start by
traditional standards. I do not know who
her first violin teachers were. At 18,
she moved to Germany then proceeded to London where she studied at the Royal Academy
of Music with Frederick Grinke. At about
age 23, her professional career began in England with the London Mozart Players
and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. Up
to about her mid-twenties, her education had been entirely founded on
traditional modern performance techniques on modern violins. Her switch to baroque (historical) approaches
took place almost by accident. Among the
many ensembles she has led and performed with are the Hanover Band, the
Australian Chamber Orchestra, the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, Les
Musiciens Du Louvre, the Raglan Baroque Players, the Orchestra of the Age of
Enlightenment, Tafelmusik, the Israel Chamber Orchestra, and the St Paul
Chamber Orchestra. In 1989, she
co-founded the Locatelli Trio. In 2008,
she founded the Wallfisch Band, a baroque ensemble that allows for
apprenticeships for young players alongside the core orchestra members –
personnel changes are made on an on-going basis. Wallfisch has held teaching positions at the
Royal Academy of Music (London), the Royal Conservatory at The Hague, and at
the University of Melbourne. She has
been concertmaster at the Carmel Bach Festival (California, U.S.) for over
twenty years. Among the recording labels
featuring her are Virgin Classics, Hyperion, and Chandos - they are easy to find on the internet. As far as I could determine, Wallfisch plays
a violin by Petrus Paulus (Pietro Paolo) de Vitor (of Brescia) from about 1750. Here is one YouTube audio file of Wallfisch
playing several Bach concertos. Here is
a short video by the Wallfisch Band playing Telemann.
Stanley Ritchie is an Australian
violinist, author, conductor, and teacher born (in Yenda, New South Wales – about
350 miles west of Sydney, Australia) on April 21, 1935. He is known for a successful career
encompassing a wide range of musical activity.
He is, however, probably best known for his later involvement in Baroque
music, being a specialist in period instrument performance. In fact, he may well have been one of the
first artists to teach (historically-informed) early music practice in America,
if not the first. Sergiu Luca also
pioneered early music playing on baroque instruments in the mid-1970s and was
the first to record the Bach unaccompanied violin works on a period
instrument; however, he did not become as well-known in the field as later violinists did. It is interesting to note
that (in 1980) Austrian violinist Norbert Brainin became involved in a
widespread movement in England and elsewhere to lower the tuning of “A” from
440 hz to 432 hz but without success. This
would have applied across the board, not just Baroque music. I personally favor a lowering of the standard
tuning. The 440 tuning has made music
sound a little too brittle and brilliant.
Nevertheless, I think we should keep modern strings – they simply last
longer. Ritchie began his violin studies
at age 7 with someone whose name is unknown to me. He enrolled at the Sydney Conservatory of
Music as a young man and graduated in 1956.
He was 21 years old. Two years
after that, he went to Paris where he studied with Jean Fournier (pupil of
George Enesco and brother of cellist Pierre Fournier.) Ritchie finally came to the U.S. in 1959. He was 24.years old. In New York, he studied with Joseph Fuchs,
Oscar Shumsky, and Samuel Kissel. In
1963, he became concertmaster of the New York City Ballet. After two years, he moved to the Metropolitan
Opera where he served as Associate Concertmaster. Raymond Gniewek was the concertmaster at the
time. From 1970 to 1973, Ritchie was a
member of the New York Chamber Soloists.
He was appointed Assistant concertmaster of the Vancouver Symphony and
played in that orchestra from 1973 to 1975.
In 1975, he joined the Philadelphia String Quartet (University of
Washington - Seattle, Washington) as first violinist. Since 1970, he had developed an interest in
early music performance as played on instruments fitted to original Baroque
standards or specifications (if one can call them that), using Baroque bows as
well. Supposedly, German
violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter has said that period instrument players are
“players who ordinarily wouldn't make it, who make silly accents with the bow,
cannot produce a sound, and think they are making something
profound." If she in fact made that
statement, she has since changed her opinion to a highly positive view. Ritchie
has been professor of violin at Indiana University since 1982 but has continued
to concertize and teach far and wide. He
has recorded for various labels, including EMI, Decca, Dorian, Nonesuch, and
Harmonia Mundi. Opinions vary, of
course, but my choices for the best authentic (period) instrument ensembles in
the world are: the English Concert, the Academy of Ancient Music, Tafelmusik,
Europa Galante, Il Giardino Armonico, the Venice Baroque Orchestra, and Les Musiciens du Louvre. Ritchie’s recording
of Vivaldi’s concerto in e minor (with the Academy of Ancient Music) is
available on YouTube here. Vivaldi wrote
more than 200 violin concertos – eleven of them are in e minor. This one is the second in Opus 11 - Opus 11
contains 5 violin concertos and number 2 is the one in e minor. Whether it’s true or not, it has been widely
reported that Igor Stravinsky (or Luigi Dallapiccola or Darius Milhaud) once
said that Vivaldi - one of the most important Baroque composers - didn’t
compose 600 concertos; “he composed one concerto six hundred times.” Ritchie
has played a Jacob Stainer violin of 1679 for some time. I do not know if he is still playing it.
Daisy Kennedy was an Australian violinist born on January 16, 1893 (Stravinsky was 11 years old.) She studied with Otakar Sevcik in Vienna in 1909, appeared in London in 1911, and toured widely in Europe and the United States, Australia, and New Zealand. She was also violinist Nigel Kennedy's second cousin. She made several recordings in 1919 and 1920. I don't know if she recorded after that. Daisy Kennedy died on October 12, 1981, at age 88.
Alma Moodie (Alma Templeton Moodie) was a Scottish (some would say Australian) violinist and teacher born on September 12, 1898 (Stravinsky was 16 years old.) She is remembered for never having recorded and for being the favorite pupil of Carl Flesch. She was a highly successful concert violinist of the early twentieth century who dropped from public view and who today is even omitted from the most popular music dictionaries. She initially studied with her mother. By age 5, however, she had a private violin tutor (Louis D'Hage) in Rockhampton, Australia, which is where she was probably born (sources differ.) By age 6, she was playing in public and by age 9. she was studying with Oskar Back at the conservatory in Brussels, Belgium. In 1919, she began studying with Carl Flesch. By 1922, she was playing ten concerts per month throughout Europe and elsewhere. She premiered several works by important composers of that era - Krenek, Pfitzner, Atterberg, and Stravinsky, among others. Many other works were also dedicated to her. After her marriage in 1927, her schedule became less hectic. She settled in Cologne and taught at the Hoch Conservatory (Frankfurt) for a time. Musical luminaries, including Leopold Auer and Arthur Nikisch, spoke highly of her. She never returned to her native Australia. She also became addicted to alcohol and sleeping pills. On March 7, 1943, Moodie died (from some type of thrombosis), at age 44. Some say she committed suicide.
