Francesca Dego

Francesca Dego is an Italian violinist, writer, and teacher born in Lecco, Italy, in 1989.  (Lecco is about 20 miles north of Milan, Italy, and about 10 miles east of Lugano, Switzerland.)  She is an ultra-Romantic artist known for her iconic interpretations of Nicolo Paganini’s music.  Her debut album (for Deutsche Gramophone) was a recording of Paganini’s 24 Caprices, played on the same Guarneri violin which Ruggiero Ricci used on the very first recording (of the unaccompanied version) of the Caprices, a Guarneri del Gesu from 1734.  That Guarneri was her instrument for many years.  She possesses a very brilliant technique (it has been described as flawless), but her approach is often an operatic one, providing dramatic and poetic sensitivity to everything she plays.  She has stated that violinists often treat Paganini’s concertos like showpieces when in fact, they are infused with vocal drama.  As can be expected, she has toured the world several times and played with every major orchestra.  Dego began violin lessons at age 4 with her father, a writer, journalist, and college professor.  For unknown reasons, the family moved to San Diego, California, when Dego was age 5 and there she studied with Michael Tseitlin at the Fairbanks School of Performing Arts.  It was also there that she made her solo debut at age 7, playing Bach’s first violin concerto.  (A recording or video of that performance may exist, but it’s not posted on the internet.)  A while later, possibly in 1998, at age 9, the family moved to Milan where she graduated from the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory, having there studied for several years with Daniele Gay, whom she holds in high esteem.  She also studied at the Stauffer Academy in Cremona, the Siena Chigiana Academy (in Siena), and the Royal College of Music in London.  Her teachers have included Salvatore Accardo, Itzhak Rashkovsky, and Schlomo Mintz.  Dego was invited to record on Paganini’s famous Guarneri violin in 2019.  After Paganini’s death, the violin had never been played for more than a few minutes at a time until Dego was granted the distinction of recording, in the span of several days, an entire CD with it.  In various interviews, Dego describes in detail the experience of the recording sessions with the violin, which included a security team of six people, posted around her at all times, including during a recital in Venice.  Dego’s discography is not yet very extensive but it includes 15 CDs – two of those CDs are devoted to chamber music (trios and quartets) and two are devoted to the music of Ferruccio Busoni, including his violin concerto.  She has recorded the complete Beethoven sonatas on three CDs.  Dego has also championed (and recorded) the violin concerto of Friedrich Wolf (better known as Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari), a concerto (published in 1944) which was dedicated to the nearly forgotten violinist Guila Bustabo.  Here is a complete recording of the concerto.  Interestingly, Dego has not commercially recorded the concertos of Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Bruch, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, or Sibelius, although they have been in her repertoire for many years - you can, however, find her live recordings of them on YouTube with different orchestras.  She has recording sessions scheduled for June, 2026, but I don’t know which works she will be recording.  Here is Dego’s recording of Paganini’s 4^th Caprice, considered the most difficult out of the 24.  In addition to being gifted with the looks of a fashion model (Versace provides gowns for her performances), she is also a writer, contributing articles to music periodicals – Strings Magazine, The Strad, Suonare News, and Musical Opinion are among them.  She has also written a book titled Tra leNote (Among the Notes) but I don’t know if it has been translated.  She is now based in London and plays a Francesco Ruggeri violin from 1697.  Here is one quote among many: “My dream is to always be able to work with orchestras and colleagues who inspire me and make it possible to create something special on stage.” 
 

Alexander Markov

Alexander Markov is a Russian (some would say American) violinist, composer, and teacher born (in Moscow) on January 24, 1963.  Although his repertoire is very extensive, he is best known for his performances (in concert, on CD, and DVD) of the 24 Paganini Caprices.  One YouTube video of his performance of the last Caprice has over 6 million views.  In fact, Markov’s playing of the pizzicato section of this Caprice sometimes leaves the audience so spellbound they interrupt the performance with rapturous, spontaneous applause – as the New York Times music critic recently explained it: “…the dazzling left-hand pizzicato variation drew a vigorous ovation midway through the work.”  Markov also plays a six-string electric violin in a rock band which he co-founded.  He co-wrote a unique rock concerto for his own use which he has had great success with.  I don’t think a commercial recording of this concerto is yet available.  Markov’s violin studies began at age 5.  His father (concert violinist Albert Markov) was his first (and most influential) teacher.  However, Markov was also enrolled at the famous Central Music School for gifted children, which is part of the Moscow (Tchaikovsky) Conservatory. There, he studied with the well-known violin pedagogue Felix Andrievsky.  (Andrievsky is now teaching at the Royal College of Music in London.)  By age 8 he had already appeared in public.  His family emigrated to the U. S. when he was 12.  They arrived in Vienna on September 11, 1975 and spent three months there before heading for the United States.  He continued studying with his father for many years.  At age 16, he made his Carnegie Hall debut in New York.  (Two sources state that he made his Carnegie Hall debut on October 9, 1983, at age 20.  He himself has said he made his debut at age 16.  The first was his debut with orchestra; the second was as soloist, in recital.)  At age 18, he began studying with Juilliard teacher Ivan Galamian.  Galamian died a few months afterward.  (Emanuel Vardi used to tell a joke that he killed Leopold Auer because Auer died a few months after Vardi began taking lessons with him.)  At age 19 (1982) Markov won second prize (most sources say the Gold Medal) at the famous Paganini Competition (Genoa, Italy) and five years later he received the Avery Fisher Career Grant.  As a result of his Paganini Competition award, he was granted the use of Paganini’s own 1743 Cannone Guarnerius for a recital performance.  (Other violinists who have played this famous violin are Leonid Kogan, Schlomo Mintz, Eugene Fodor, Salvatore Accardo, Maxim Vengerov, Gerard Poulet, Regina Carter, Anna Tifu, Dmitri Berlinsky, and Ruggiero Ricci.)  Markov’s concertizing has taken him to all corners of the world and to most of the world’s great concert halls and orchestras with top conductors on the podium.  As do most concert violinists, he also participates in music festivals far and wide.  He also frequently gives masterclasses all around the world.  He has recorded for the Erato and Warner Classics labels.  His recordings are easy to find on the internet.  Although he used to play a Guarnerius Del Gesu violin, Markov has been playing a 1970 Sergio Peresson violin for some time.  He recorded the 24 caprices on that violin.  I have heard it up close - it is indistinguishable from any Strad or Guarneri violin.  Here is a YouTube video of the Paganini Caprice number 5 with Markov using the original bowings.  The photo is courtesy of the Alexander Markov website. 

Heimo Haitto

Heimo Haitto was a Finnish violinist, teacher, conductor, writer, and actor born (in Viipuri, Finland) on May 22, 1925.  He is Finland’s most famous violinist, although he is now (unjustly) forgotten.  Haitto was a notorious, unconventional classical musician, in the style of Nicolo Paganini, Arthur Hartman, Elias Breeskin, and Eugene Fodor.  He was a gambler and loved drinking, although it has been said he was not an alcoholic.  He deliberately turned his concertizing career off a couple of times.  For a time, he actually lived the life of a vagabond, being literally homeless, traveling by train, in boxcars.  However, notwithstanding all of the turmoil, idiosyncrasies, romantic excesses, and bohemian lifestyle, he was a brilliant violinist and a genuine artist.  I think it can be said he had an extraordinary zest for life.  YouTube now contains some of his performances.  As Pinchas Zukerman has done, Haitto married a cellist (Beverly LeBeck, pupil of Pablo Casals) and, later on, an actress (Marja-Liisa Nisula.)  He married a third time in the mid 1970s.  Haitto’s playing style reminds me somewhat of Ivry Gitlis.  Haitto wrote his memoirs in the early 1970s (Heimo Haitto Maailmalla - published in 1976) but I don’t think there’s an English translation available.  He also published a book on his violin playing experiences in 1994 - Viuluniakka Kulkurina.  Although his father worked for the railroad, he was also a violinist and gave Haitto his first lessons, beginning at age 5.  At age 9, Haitto’s father took him to the Vyborg Music Academy and left him entirely in the care of professor Boris Sirpo (1893-1967.)  (Vyborg and Viipuri are one and the same city.)  Under Sirpo’s tough and rigid supervision, Haitto practiced almost constantly.  At age 13, Haitto made his public debut in Helsinki with the Helsinki Philharmonic and Sirpo on the podium.  He also appeared in his first movie – Soldier’s Bride – playing the part of a boy violinist.  In that same year he won an international violin competition sponsored by the British Council of Music in London and soon after briefly toured the Scandinavian countries.  In that year also, due to the Russian-Finnish war, Sirpo brought Haitto to the U.S. to tour on behalf of the Red Cross.  In fact, Haitto's Guarnerius had been destroyed in an air raid.  By then, Haitto had already been studying rigorously under Sirpo’s very strict tutelage for five years.  According to some sources, Haitto was not allowed to have contact with his family during those years.  Arriving in the U.S. in February of 1940, Haitto appeared with the Philadelphia Orchestra in April of that year, playing the Paganini D major concerto.  That was his U.S. debut.  He also soloed with many other American orchestras.  He played in Carnegie Hall under John Barbirolli as well.  Eventually, accompanied by Sirpo, he settled in Portland, Oregon in 1942.  Most European artists arriving in the U.S in those years chose to begin their American careers from home bases in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, or even Chicago, but not Haitto.  In 1943, Haitto was released by his strict teacher and set out on his own.  He then settled in Los Angeles.  There, he played in the Los Angeles Philharmonic (September/1952 to May/1954) and in Hollywood studio orchestras but appeared far and wide as a soloist as well.  He was 18 years old.  He also appeared in another movie: There is Magic in Music.  That's the same movie that violinist Patricia Travers appeared in as a very young teenager. One source says he enlisted in the military but another says he was not accepted because he was foreign-born.  In actuality, he desired to be a parachutist in the Marine Corps but his enlistment was declined, even though he had a letter of recommendation from President Franklin D. Roosevelt.  Instead, he was made a part of the Army Special Services.  That's how he ended up in New York.  Among the group that was in that Special Services Unit with Haitto were Ruggiero Ricci, Red Skelton, Mickey Rooney, and Eddie Fisher.  In New York, he studied privately with Ivan Galamian, famous teacher at Juilliard.  Haitto and Isaac Stern became friends there during this time - Stern was studying with Louis Persinger.  With five other violinists, Haitto performed Paganini's 24 Caprices, each Caprice being alternately played by each violinist until all five played together at the end.  Later, in Los Angeles, Haitto became friends with Jascha Heifetz and was a guest at Heifetz' house many times.  Haitto had married Beverly LeBeck in New York in the spring of 1945.  He was 20 years old.  His new wife later (like him) became a cellist in the Los Angeles Philharmonic - 1949-1950 and, again, 1954-1955.  Evidently, they did not play in the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the same time.  Brilliant as he was, Haitto was dismissed from the orchestra due to excessive absences and other problems.  It has been reported that he loved to go to Las Vegas and gambled heavily.  During the 1950s, he concertized and became the conductor of an orchestra in Salem, Oregon.  Haitto and Beverly moved to Seattle after Beverly left the Los Angeles Philharmonic.  He eventually became the concertmaster of the Seattle Symphony and also conducted a youth orchestra at the Cornish School of Arts in Seattle.  The third photo (circa 1955) shows Beverly and Haitto in the kitchen of the home of a close friend in Seattle.  The photo is courtesy of Mr Ed Vainio, now a resident of Montana (USA), in whose parents' home the photo was taken.  Haitto visited Finland in 1948 and again in 1956.  He moved to Mexico City and lived there (with Beverly LeBeck) between 1960 and 1962, serving as concertmaster of an orchestra, but I don’t know which orchestra.  At the time, there were four professional orchestras in the city.  In 1962, Beverly LeBeck began playing in the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra (New York.)  Haitto spent the years between 1963 and 1965 in Finland.  After divorcing LeBeck, he married Marja-Liisa Nisula (the actress) in 1964 but divorced her 2 years later.  From 1965 to about 1976, he was a vagabond (in the U.S.) and even spent some time in jail.  In 1976, Haitto returned to Finland permanently and began to practice again.  He was 51 years old.  He also remarried (Eva Vastari this time) in that year and, six months later, he was ready to play again.  Vastari had been a journalist.  In childhood he had played a Guarnerius violin but in adulthood I don’t know what he played.  He actually built two (red) violins which he used for performances and recordings.  Those violins now hang in Haitto's favorite restaurant in Helsinki - Tin Tin Tango.   Vastari and Haitto formed a duo.  She read poetry and he played.  He also did some teaching and lecturing at the Lahti Conservatory and other schools.  They finally settled in Marbella, Spain.  The photo shows him playing dominoes there.  Haitto fell ill in 1995 and died on June 10, 1999, at age 74.  Haitto made several commercial recordings which are still available, though they are not easy to find; however, his recording of the Sibelius concerto (along with Six Humoresques which Sibelius wrote as Opus 87 and Opus 89) can be found here.  Finlandia Classics has also released Haitto's recording of the Paganini concerto (number 1) and the Vieuxtemps concerto (number 4) - that release can be found here.  He also recorded for Finnish National Radio (YLE) broadcasts -  those recordings might not be available.  You can hear his unique style of playing here and here.  Most of Heimo Haitto's video and audio files can be found on this Channel - it is Tuomas Haitto's YouTube channel - Tuomas Haitto is Heimo Haitto's nephew.  

Alessandro Rolla

Alessandro Rolla was an Italian violinist, violist, composer, conductor, and teacher, born on April 22, 1757.  Although he was a very successful virtuoso of his time, he is most famous for being one of Paganini’s teachers.  Unfortunately, he lived during a time when many great musical luminaries roamed the earth – Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Rossini, Chopin, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Liszt, and Berlioz, to name the better-known among them.  For example, after Mozart died in 1791, Rolla lived an additional 50 years and was witness to Mozart’s eventual universal success.  His life also encompassed Beethoven’s and Schubert’s entire lifetimes.  As a violinist, he was eclipsed by the likes of Paganini, Giovanni Viotti, Louis Spohr, Karol Lipinski, Rodolphe Kreutzer, Heinrich Ernst, and Pierre Rode.  Some of his compositions (about 600 in all according to one source) attest to the fact that many techniques which Paganini routinely used later on – including left-hand pizzicato, extremely high hand positions on the fingerboard, octaves, and double stopping - were first put forward by Rolla.  After his early studies, he moved to Milan where he studied from 1770 to 1778.  At his first public performance, he played a viola concerto of his own composition, said to be the first viola concerto ever heard.  That was in 1772 - he was 15 years old.  However, he did not write the first viola concerto – the first viola concerto was, in all likelihood, written by George Telemann.  In 1782, he was made leader of the Ducal Orchestra in Parma, Italy, playing violin and viola.  He was 25 years old.  He first met Paganini in 1795.  Paganini was then 13 years old.  How much time Paganini actually spent studying with Rolla is anyone’s guess.  It could have been one lesson or several or many.  During those years in Parma, Rolla traveled widely, published many of his works in Paris and Vienna, and conducted far and wide.  He was at Parma until 1802.  He then moved to Milan, where he was concertmaster and conductor of the opera orchestra at La Scala.  It has been said that none other than Louis Spohr praised this orchestra highly.  In 1808, the year of its inauguration, Rolla was made violin and viola professor of the Milan Conservatory, having been invited by Bonifazio Asioli, its first Director.  In 1811, Rolla was also director of the Cultural Society in Milan.  He was associated with La Scala until 1833 – thirty one years.  Upon leaving, Rolla was 76 years old.  At La Scala, he had conducted many of the operas of Mozart, Rossini, Donizetti, and Bellini, among others.  He had also conducted Beethoven’s early symphonies as part of his activities with the Cultural Society.  He was among the first contributors to the music catalog of the famous Italian publisher, Ricordi.  These works included violin etudes in all keys.  His fame spread far and wide via publication of his works in Leipzig, Paris, Vienna, London, and Milan.  For the viola, he wrote no fewer than a dozen concertos, as well as duos for viola in combination with an assortment of other instruments.  He also wrote many violin concertos.  One of the more recent champions of Rolla's music was Emanuel Vardi.  Some, but certainly not many, of Rolla's works have been recorded and some of his music is still in print.  You can listen to tiny bits of some very charming works by Rolla here.  One of several YouTube postings can be found here and an extensive list of his works is available at this website.  Rolla died on September 15, 1841, at age 84.  Though very highly regarded and almost surely well-compensated during his lifetime, he became neglected in more modern times.  Before someone rescued their music from oblivion, the same fate befell Bach, Vivaldi, and Zelenka.  Perhaps things will change for Rolla, though that is unlikely.  

On The High Cs

It has long been my opinion that in order for an artist to be able to perform, she needs Conviction, Control, Courage, Confidence, Composure, and Concentration.  To a great degree, these are overlapping attitudes.  Conviction is simply the foundation upon which careers (and lives) are built – it is the belief that what one is doing is worth doing to the best of one’s ability.  (Oprah Winfrey once said that you are what you believe. She knows that for sure.)  Before one can convince an audience, one has to be self-convinced.  You might question Leila Josefowicz’ interpretations but not her conviction – it is there in spades.  Then comes Control – that is the same as knowledge or technique – if one cannot exert full control over one’s physical preparedness – control over intonation, rhythm, and tone problems - then one is actually not ready to do the job.  Courage enables us to take that first step onto the stage.  However, Courage comes in varying degrees.  Some of us can muster enough of it to perform in groups, though not as soloists or conductors.  There’s nothing wrong with that.  Isaac Stern called it arrogance and perhaps, in his case, that’s what it was.  Confidence is an attitude that convinces others that you know you can succeed, but it comes after one takes that first step.  Composure is an attitude which overcomes panic.  Ivan Galamian’s solo career didn’t pan out because he was terror-stricken at the thought of playing in front of an audience.  Fear can undermine even the best-prepared, best-trained artist.  Finally comes Concentration.  Imagine going out to play Beethoven or Mendelssohn with great conviction, control, confidence, courage, and composure, but then focusing your attention on the conductor’s very loose bow tie or the second clarinet’s flat tuning or the Principal cellist’s unpolished shoes or the fidgety little boy in the front row.  This is how tiny, little lapses enter a performance.  This is how careers get destroyed.  There are critics out there who know how the music should go – they talk and they write and they tell people who care about these things.  However, these factors only make a career feasible.  Sustainability is another matter. 

Paganini's Competition

In Paganini’s day, there may have been eight or nine other concert violinists who might have (theoretically) competed with him – Heinrich Ernst, Louis Spohr, Pierre Rode, Giovanni Viotti, Franz Clement, Charles DeBeriot, Pierre Baillot, Rodolphe Kreutzer, and, of course, Karol Lipinski.  That’s it.  All of these potential competitors spent a great deal of their time either teaching or conducting (or playing in) orchestras.  That circumstance left the field wide open for Paganini to exploit.  Even if Paganini was not the astonishing wizard everyone says he was, according to contemporary accounts, he was still the best.  (We do not now know exactly how Paganini sounded nor how well he played but we give him the benefit of the doubt.  If you’ve ever heard the recordings left by Joachim, Ysaye, Sarasate, Flesch, Enesco and other nineteenth century violinists said to be great in their day, you know how deficient they were in some ways, especially in their sound and intonation.)  In this day of sophisticated electronic gadgetry which can reproduce every note of any music score perfectly, we no longer readily forgive technical deficiencies in any violinist.  Nowadays, it is not easy for concert violinists to get established and generate steady concert dates - much more difficult than in Paganini’s time.  There are brilliant violinists all over the place, but, at the same time, only a limited number of open dates.  Of course, if there were no other artists around, it would be so much easier, but violinists have to contend with solo pianists, singers, cellists, horn players, oboe players, clarinet players, trumpet players, percussionists, trombone players, and even viola players, all of them wanting a bigger piece of the concert artist’s pie.  (I have only accompanied three solo violists since I was 16 – Roberto Diaz, Miles Hoffman, and Carolyn Kenneson.)  If it weren’t for teaching spots at music schools and universities, things would be tough indeed.  What does it take to stand out?  Charlie Rose, the interviewer, once asked Zubin Mehta what it was that made a great conductor and Mehta very wisely answered: “it’s not one thing, but a combination of things.”  Perhaps the same can be said of solo violinists.  Leaving the technical brilliance aside, however, I’m sure Paganini would have been very successful in our age.  After all, he was an expert, intuitive showman.  We simply would not be able to ignore him.  In his own day, he scandalized polite society by his lifestyle – as did also Vivaldi, Wagner, Chopin, Liszt, Eugene Goossens, Bronislaw Huberman, Olga Rudge, and a few others.  And, it has been said by people who know about these things, that there is no such thing as bad publicity - we can put two and two together. While there may be many obscure (but great) violinists in our own time – some more obscure than others - nevertheless, let us not forget that Eugene Ysaye, Vasa Prihoda, Albert Sammons, Alfredo Campoli, Jacques Thibaud, and Zino Francescatti were also quite unknown at some point, even after they had proved their exceptional playing abilities.  Then, out of nowhere it seems, they got lucky. (Photo courtesy of violinist Allegra Artis)

Publicity - Huberman's Epilogue

Bronislaw Huberman had many ideas which were somewhat ahead of their time and which took root after he died.  Beginning in 1920, he spoke often in favor of a United Europe – today’s European Union.  It was known as Pan Europeanism in those days but it didn’t actually get its legal start until March of 1957 – ten years after Huberman had left the scene.  Its ultimate goal was to prevent future wars between European nations.  He was also so outspoken regarding the banning of Jewish musicians in Germany that in 1935, the Nazi government named him “the greatest enemy of the Nazi regime among world musicians.”  He proclaimed that Rhythm was the most important factor in musical expression.  His idea of violin mastery was the presentation of Truth - via performing - rather than Beauty.  Perhaps he felt – as the saying goes – that beauty was only skin deep.  Huberman said that art and publicity were inseparable, and necessary to overcome the “law of inertia that rules over the masses.”  In fact, he felt that artists were obliged to provide publicity.  On one of his Russian tours, he contrived to have the newspapers publish rumors that he was going to divorce his wife and marry a Russian aristocrat.  He later explained to his wife that it was a harmless publicity stunt.  She was not amused but the news generated lots of talk and curiosity.  Huberman almost never played to other than sold out houses.  He made people anxious to attend his concerts.  In 1943, he played to an audience of 10,000 in Lewisohn Stadium in New York.  (The Royal Albert Hall, site of the annual Proms concerts, sits 5,550.)  He later said:”The development of artistic taste is another benefit of contact with the public.  The artist learns what influences the masses, what is better for the elite, and what touches everybody's heart.  Art does not belong to the artist only. True art must benefit everybody, otherwise it is not art.  I have to say that I have developed the highest respect for what is called ‘the popular voice.’  Yet the public is a wonder, full of pure instinct, open heart, and the ability to marvel.  At the same time, it is lacking conscience and logic, but these are the qualities that the artist must have to be able to learn from his public.”  I don’t tire of saying that the audience is the final arbiter.  It can make bad judgments in the short term but in the long run, it is always right.  Maybe Huberman was saying the same thing.  In this day of internet promotion, his words cannot be taken too lightly.  He knew well the need to create something other than just the music, just as Paganini did more than 200 years ago.  Of course, Huberman was a brilliant violinist who practiced tirelessly.  Still, that alone is not enough.  There is nothing like drama – tragedy, courage, and triumph - to get the imagination soaring. 

Natasha Korsakova

Natasha Korsakova is a Russian violinist and writer born on January 24, 1978 (Itzhak Perlman was 32 years old and Jascha Heifetz was 77 years old.)  She is the only concert violinist that I know of who is fluent in five languages.  (The only other violinists who were fluent in that many languages were Henryk Szeryng and Otakar Sevcik.)  She is also the only one who has an exclusive concert dress designer (Laura Biagiotti) and the only one named artist-of-the-year in two different countries (Italy and Chile.)  It is noteworthy that while female concert violinists are moving towards more glamorous fashions, (witness Sophie Mutter, Sarah Chang, and Akiko Meyers), the males are becoming more ungraceful and casual, perhaps even grotesque (witness Joshua Bell, Leonidas Kavakos, and Nigel Kennedy.)  It has been said that Korsakova is very bold and charismatic.  Her violin studies began at age 5 and her first public performance took place at age 7 in Moscow.  However, her first teacher was not her father but her grandfather (Boris Korsakov), although she later studied with her violinist father (Andrej Korsakov, who studied with the legendary Leonid Kogan.)  She later studied in Germany with Ulf Klausenitzer and Saschko Gawriloff (at the Advanced Music School – Musikhochschule - in Cologne – 1995-1999.)  Nevertheless, her orchestral debut was back in 1985 with the Voronezh (Russia) Orchestra.  (This orchestra has been associated with several leading Russian conductors, including Evgeny Svetlanov, Kiril Kondrashin, Emin Khachaturian, Neemi Yarvi, and Alexander Dmitriev, and regularly plays in Moscow and St Petersburg.  It has also accompanied innumerable major artists: among them, Emil Gilels, Gidon Kremer, Vladimir Spivakov, Igor Oistrakh, Yuri Bashmet, Alexander Zhukov, Maxim Vengerov, and Mikhail Pletnev.)  She spent the first seventeen years of her life in Russia where her musical lineage goes back about six generations and includes composer Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908), her great-grand uncle.  Korsakova has already toured (practically) the entire world and, of course, played in most of the world’s prestigious concert halls, with top conductors and major orchestras.  She has recorded several CDs which are available on the internet at ArizonaRecordings (and through ITunes and other electronic download venues) and there are several videos of her playing on YouTube.  She also delves seriously into chamber music and far flung music festivals, as do all concert violinists nowadays.  In the year 2004 she performed the Tchaikovsky concerto in Berlin for the 15th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall.  In 2008, she played a special concert in Vienna the night before the official opening of the European Football Championships.  She has also been invited to play for the Italian State President and his guests at the Palazzo Quirinale in Rome.  In 2010, she premiered and recorded (with the Czech Philharmonic) two concertos written for and dedicated to her – one by Robert Vinson (Concerto in F) and the second by Daniel Schnyder (Mozart in China.)  Korsakova has played a Vincenzo Panormo (also known as Vincenzo Trusiano) violin but is currently playing a Giovanni Pressenda (Turin, 1843) from the collection of Giovanni Accornero, Italian expert on luthiers, author, and instrument collector and dealer.  In 2011, she and Swiss violinist Manrico Padovani (the first Swiss violinist to have recorded the 24 Paganini Caprices) will record several double concertos by Alfred Schnittke, J.S. Bach, Arvo Part, and Antonio Vivaldi. 

Eduard Grach

Eduard Grach is a Russian violinist, teacher, and conductor born on December 19, 1930 (Heifetz was 29 years old.)  He is considered Russia’s preeminent and most illustrious violin pedagogue – currently, head of the violin department at the Moscow (Tchaikovsky) Conservatory from which he graduated.  Though he has traveled the world as a touring virtuoso, he has chosen to remain in Russia (as did David Oistrakh and Leonid Kogan before him) rather than emigrate, as so many other Russian artists have done.  His first teachers (as a child in Odessa) were Veniamin Z. Mordkovich and Peter Stolyarsky – in fact, he was among Stolyarsky’s last pupils (Stolyarsky died in 1944.)  At the Moscow Conservatory he was in Abram Yampolsky’s class.  Nevertheless, he also studied with David Oistrakh after graduation.  Between 1949 and 1962 he received first prizes in three international violin competitions – Bela Bartok (1949 – at age 19), Jacques Thibaud (1955), and Tchaikovsky (1962 – some sources say 1958.)  He had by then already embarked on a concertizing and teaching career across Europe, Russia, the Middle East, and Asia. For a time, Grach was soloist of the State Philharmonic Society as well. Every top honor afforded the finest Russian artists has been bestowed on him, including the Order of National Merit.  He has over 100 recordings to his credit (many of them live performances which have been highly praised), has premiered many contemporary works, has conducted master classes worldwide (including the U.S., China, and Israel), and judged in several international violin competitions (including the Paganini, Wieniawski, and Tchaikovsky), the latest being the First Buenos Aires International Violin Competition (July, 2010.)  Many of his recordings are readily available on the internet.  Along the way, Grach was named honorary professor of the Shanghai Conservatory too, though I do not know in what year. In 1990, he founded the Moscovia Chamber Orchestra; however, he had been conducting other ensembles since 1979.  He has taken the Moscovia on tour to Germany, Greece, Cyprus, France, and China.  (Some fascinating performances of the Moscovia are available on YouTube. It does not shy away from playing a very eclectic repertoire, from Bach to Rossini to popular Argentine tangos.)  In 1996, he organized the Yampolsky International Violin Competition and has been its President several times. There are many videos of his playing on YouTube and a magnificent interview of him on Blip.tv (if you speak Russian, I recommend it.)

Albert Markov

Albert Markov is a Russian (Ukrainian) violinist, composer, pedagogue, and conductor born on May 8, 1933 (Heifetz was 32 years old.)  He occupies a place in the musical firmament which is unique in the 20th and 21^st centuries – he is the only concert violinist who is also a composer of major works and concertos.  Not since Emile Sauret (1852-1920), Jeno Hubay (1858-1937), and Albert Spalding (1888-1953) did any violinist of international stature produce not only symphonic works, but violin concertos which he himself performed, in keeping with a longstanding tradition which included Tartini, Vivaldi, Paganini, Spohr, Viotti, Wieniawski, Vieuxtemps, DeBeriot, Chevalier DeSaint George, and Joseph Joachim.  Of course, Eugene Ysaye, Pablo Sarasate, Kreisler, Milstein, Heifetz and others wrote or arranged many recital pieces or cadenzas but it stopped there – no operas, symphonies, tone poems, rhapsodies, or concertos came from their pens.  In addition, not since David Oistrakh and Leonid Kogan, has a concert violinist produced a son who is also a concert violinist, in this case, Alexander Markov.  (In fact, Alexander Markov has never had a teacher besides his father.  Zino Francescatti and Daniel Barenboim also never studied with anyone other than their father.)  He began his violin studies as a child but by age ten he was studying with Jacob Meksin and the legendary pedagogue, Peter Stolyarsky.  Composition he studied with Henrich Litinsky and Aram Khachaturian.  He graduated from the Gnessin Academy in Moscow in 1960.  By then, he had already won the Gold Medal at the Queen Elizabeth (Belgium) Violin Competition (1959) and gold medals at other European and Russian competitions (1957-1964.)  He concertized extensively in Russia and Europe from that point forward.  A highlight of one of his European tours was an appearance with Rostropovitch (cellist) in Holland in 1964 with Khachaturian conducting.  From 1960 to 1975, he was a soloist with the Moscow State Philharmonic as well as a professor at the Gnessin Academy in Moscow.  In December of 1975 he came to the U.S.  His U.S. debut on May 24, 1976 was memorable and unusual because it was not in New York but in Houston (Eddy Brown’s U.S. debut was in Indianapolis, Isaac Stern’s in San Francisco, Iso Briselli’s in Philadelphia), where he played Paganini’s second violin concerto (b minor.)  (He later recorded this concerto with the Moscow Radio Orchestra, Rozhdestvensky conducting – very likely the best recording of this work in existence.)  His Carnegie Hall debut came later and, from that point, Markov’s concertizing became international in scope.  In 1977 he was appointed to the faculty of the Mannes College of Music (New York), where he stayed until 1979.  In 1981 he began to teach at the Manhattan School of Music (where he still teaches) and from 2007 has also taught at the Long Island Conservatory.  Markov has also served on the juries of the Tchaikovsky and the Paganini Violin Competitions and led many music festivals and master classes around the world.  In May of 1994, Markov embarked on a tour of Russia after an absence of almost twenty years.  In 1999, he formed the Rondo Chamber Orchestra, based in Bennington, Vermont, which he has conducted ever since.  His recordings are on the Melodia, Sunrise, Musical Heritage Society, and RMS labels.  Most of his prolific output has been published by Muzyka and Kompositor in Russia as well as Schirmer’s and RMS in the U.S.  His violin method book, Violin Technique is also available worldwide.  It has been said (by Bernard Holland of the New York Times) that Markov's pedagogy “avoids the traditional teaching of hand positions and fingerings on the violin….  Markov also breaks the art of bowing into three basic positions - another departure from ordinary teaching practices.”  There are many videos of his playing on YouTube and several audio recordings on the Classical Connect website as well.  Markov’s instruments have included a Stradivarius, an Antonio Gagliano, and a Sergio Peresson (based in Philadelphia, Peresson is considered to be the world’s best violin maker of the modern era - he was in so much demand he had to stop taking orders for new instruments in 1982.)  Markov’s compositions include two operas, a violin concerto, a Suite for violin and orchestra, a symphony, 3 Rhapsodies for violin and orchestra, a string quartet, 2 sonatas for solo violin, various works for two violins, 9 works for violin and piano, vocal works, piano pieces, works for viola, at least 20 cadenzas for various violin concertos (including those of Paganini, Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms), and no fewer than 70 arrangements of works by various composers.

Julia Igonina

Julia Igonina is a Russian concert violinist born on April 3, 1978 (Heifetz was 77 years old.)  She is widely known as a champion of contemporary violin works, though her repertoire includes the standard concertos of Bach, Brahms, Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, Glazunov, Prokofiev, Sibelius, and all the rest.  One of the rare pieces she plays is Alexander Tchaikovsky’s second violin concerto, a fiendishly difficult work.  Her recital repertoire is also incredibly extensive.  She began her violin studies at the age of six with Vyacheslav Khavkin at the Glinka Music School in Minsk (1984-1997.)  Afterward, she studied with Eduard Grach at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow, from which she graduated in 2004.  (Grach has become the most eminent violin pedagogue in the Russian Federation since Zakhar Bron went to the Royal Academy in England.)  Her debut came at the age of fourteen with the Belarus State Orchestra playing the Mendelssohn concerto.  She has since concertized extensively in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.  As far as I know, she has never played in the U.S.  Igonina has also won (between 1998 and 2005) several major violin competitions.  As Nicolo Paganini played for royalty, Yehudi Menuhin played for the Pope, Isaac Stern played for the U.S. President, and Chloe Hanslip played for the Queen of England, Julia Igonina has also played for a highly placed world dignitary - the President of the Republic of China (Jiang Zemin - 2004.)  In 2008, she became the leader of the New Russian Quartet, based at the Moscow (Tchaikovsky) Conservatory.  She began to judge at international violin competitions in 2009.  YouTube has several videos of her playing, including a brilliant interpretation of the Vitali Chaconne which Heifetz made famous.  Igonina plays on a Vincenzo Panormo (aka Vincenzo Trusiano) violin (made circa 1789) - formerly, Julian Sitkovetsky's violin.  (Photo of Julia Igonina by Anna Chobotova)