Hubert Leonard

Hubert Leonard was a Belgian violinist, teacher, and composer born (in Bellaire) on April 7, 1819.  He is mostly remembered for having taught – for almost 20 years - at the Brussels Conservatory where Charles De Beriot, between 1843 and 1852, had also taught.  Leonard later settled in Paris where he continued to teach privately.  Among his most celebrated students were Henry Schradieck and Martin Marsick.  As a child, he began his studies with his father and even gave a public concert before entering  the Brussels Conservatory in 1832, at age 12.  From age 9, he had also been studying privately with an obscure teacher surnamed Rouma - this is probably one and the same as Francois Prume, another Belgian violinist who at age 17 (1832) was already professor of violin at the Liege Conservatory and who was only 3 years older than Leonard.  Leonard enrolled in the Paris Conservatory in 1836 where his principal teacher was Francois Habeneck.  He was 17 years old.  Funding for his studies came from a wealthy merchant.  He left the conservatory in 1839 but stayed in Paris where he was employed by the orchestras of the Variety Theatre and the Opera Comique.  He toured through various European cities from 1844 to 1848.  A single source gives a different date for this event in Leonard’s life (1845.)  In Leipzig, he met Mendelssohn who briefly tutored him in composition.  Leonard also learned Mendelssohn’s concerto and played it on tour.  The concerto had just then recently been premiered in 1845 by Ferdinand David but Leonard was the first to play it in Berlin with Mendelssohn on the podium.  Leonard began teaching at the Brussels Conservatory in 1848 (Grove’s Dictionary says 1847), at age 29, but continued to tour sporadically, extending his tours as far as Norway and Russia.  After quitting the conservatory in Brussels in 1866, he again settled in Paris, where he spent the next 24 years.  Leonard’s compositions include five (or six) violin concertos, duos for violin and piano, a cadenza for the Beethoven concerto, fantasias, salon pieces, and etude books for violin, including a book entitled 24 classic etudes.  I am not certain but I’m pretty sure the concertos have never been recorded.  Supposedly, Leonard once said “The bow is the master, the fingers of the left hand are but his servants.”  Leonard died in Paris on May 6, 1890, at age 71.  He had owned a G.B. Guadagnini (1751), an Andrea Guarneri (1665), and two Magginis, one of which went to his widow, who sold it in 1891.  

Emile Sauret

Emile Sauret was a French violinist and composer born on May 22, 1852 (Brahms was 19 years old.) He began studying violin at age 6 with Charles Rondolet at Strasburg. Two years later, he was already concertizing. As a young touring artist, his father was his constant companion. Later on, and almost simultaneously, he studied with Charles De Beriot and Henri Vieuxtemps. Like Paganini before him, he never attended a conservatory. His first appearance in England was in 1862, at age 10. He made a return visit in 1866. He was known for his constant European and world-wide travels and his numerous friendships with the most famous musicians of his time – Rossini, Grieg, Brahms, Liszt, Bruch, Saint Saenz, Tchaikovsky, Wagner, Sarasate, Ernst, Wieniawski, Bazzini, and Sivori, to name a few. He toured the U.S. in 1872, where Liszt accompanied him on at least two recitals. He also often played for French Emperor-President Napoleon III and his court. It has been said that his repertoire included no less than 70 concertos and 400 miscellaneous works. In 1873, he married Teresa Carreno, the Venezuelan concert pianist and composer of the national anthem of Venezuela. They divorced in 1875. In 1879, he married Emmy Hotter and henceforth taught at the Stern Academy in Berlin for a number of years. 1890 found him teaching at the Royal Academy of Music in London, which he made his home until his death. In 1903, he taught at the Chicago Musical College. One of his students in Chicago was Sol B. Cohen, a well-known composer, violinist, conductor, and teacher of the early and mid Twentieth Century. Sauret's last teaching appointment was at the Trinity College of Music (in London) where he taught between 1915 and 1919. Among Sauret's famous pupils are William Reed and Isolde Menges. Today, Sauret is mostly remembered for the famous and very difficult cadenza he wrote for Paganini’s first violin concerto, although he wrote more than 200 other works, including three violin concertos - the first in g minor, the second in E major, and the third in B minor. He also wrote a book of extraordinarily difficult violin studies which almost nobody uses now. A Stradivarius violin from 1685 is named after him. A Guarnerius violin from 1744 is also named after him. Sauret died in London on February 12, 1920, at age 68.

Charles De Beriot

Charles Auguste de Bériot was a Belgian violinist and composer born on February 20, 1802 (Beethoven was 32 years old.) It is said that his playing was influenced by Viotti, Baillot, and Paganini. He toured Europe extensively and was chamber violinist to King Charles the Tenth of France and King William the First of the Netherlands. In 1843, De Beriot became a professor of violin at the Brussels Conservatory. His best known pupil was Henri Vieuxtemps. He retired from that post in 1852. His compositions are varied and he wrote no less than 10 violin concertos. He is remembered for his violin etude books which are still in use today. De Beriot died in 1870.