Peter Rybar

Peter Rybar was a Czech violinist and teacher born (in Vienna, Austria) on August 29, 1913.  His playing style was not showy and flashy but he was very well regarded as a soloist and concertmaster - Rybar’s recordings (mostly produced prior to 1960) are now collector’s items.  (His recording of the Bach Double Concerto (for two violins) with Henryk Szeryng is probably the best I have ever heard.)  Nonetheless, as were so many other artists of the time, he was eclipsed by the likes of Heifetz, Ricci, Oistrakh, Menuhin, Milstein, Francescatti, Kogan, Grumiaux, and a few other soloists who performed in the limelight during the same period.  Like Szeryng, he became fluent in seven languages, although (ironically) English was his mother tongue.  His first teacher (a pupil of both Otakar Sevcik and Cesar Thomson) was his mother.  He then studied in Geneva and Leipzig with teachers whom I don’t know anything about.  He eventually (in 1929, at age 16) ended up at the Prague Conservatory where he spent three years (perhaps more.)  One of his teachers there was Josef Suk - the elder Josef Suk (1874-1935.)  (There are three Josef Suk: the grandfather (composer and son-in-law of Antonin Dvorak); the father (an engineer but also an accomplished amateur violinist); and the son (the well-known concert violinist.)  Rybar also later (from 1934 onward) studied with Carl Flesch in Paris.  By then, he had already begun his concertizing career (at age 19) and been playing professionally for at least two years.  He toured Europe many times and became known for playing the Bach Sonatas and Partitas for unaccompanied violin to which he had dedicated more than a year of study during a sabbatical in Portugal.  Although he did not premiere the piece (Samuel Dushkin did in Berlin), Rybar was the first to play the Stravinsky violin concerto (composed in 1931) in Prague and in Paris.  He was also the first to record the Goldmark and the Viotti (number 22 in a minor) concertos.  In 1937 (some sources say 1938), he was hired as violin professor at the Winterthur Conservatory (one of the oldest in Europe) and as concertmaster of the Winterthur Symphony in Switzerland.  He was 25 years old.  (Winterthur can almost be considered a suburb of Zurich.)  In 1952, he formed a duo with his wife who was a pianist.  He retired from his posts (as well as first violinist in the orchestra’s string quartet) after about 30 years.  In 1970, he was persuaded to abandon his retirement to become concertmaster of the Orchestra of the Suisse Romande in Geneva.  At the same time, he began teaching at the Geneva Conservatory.  He was 57 years old by then.  In 1980, he left the orchestra but I don’t know if he left the conservatory as well.  He often gave recitals with pianists Wilhelm Backhaus, Edwin Fischer, and Helene Boschi.  He also sometimes partnered with Clara Haskil as well (who often accompanied Arthur Grumiaux) in recitals and recordings.  Rybar last played in public in 1986.  His discography is not extensive but it fills at least two dozen CDs and includes the standard concertos as well as some not-often-heard works like the Tartini d minor concerto and the Schumann concerto.  A few of his hard-to-find recordings are priced at over one thousand dollars.  Here is a YouTube audio file of the Tartini concerto.  Rybar died in Lugano, Switzerland, on October 4, 2002 at age 89.  

Rusanda Panfili

Rusanda Panfili is a Moldovan-Romanian violinist, actress, dancer, singer, teacher, and arranger born (in Chisinau, Moldova – Chisinau is about 80 miles Northwest of Odessa, Ukraine) on November 1, 1988.  She is known for her extreme versatility and ease in performing in very different styles (genres) and for being one of very few contemporary violinists who arrange music for their own performance and their own style.   Many violinists from the past (to name a few: Cesar Thomson, Eugene Ormandy, Maud Powell, Paul Kochanski, Arthur Hartmann, Elias Breeskin, Nathan Milstein, Fritz Kreisler, Jascha Heifetz) used to do just that but the current generation has forgotten that tradition.  An indication of her diverse interests in music can be understood by knowing that she has collaborated with artists ranging from Aleksey Igudesman to Vadim Repin and everyone in between.  Panfili is also one of very (very) few living violinists fluent in five languages – German, Russian, English, Romanian, and Spanish.  Panfili began her violin studies with her mother at age 3 in Bucharest, Romania, where her family had relocated after living in Moldova for a number of years.  Though there were quite a few teachers involved in her early training (at the George Enescu Music School in Bucharest), her mother (who had studied violin but was not a professional violinist) remained her main tutor and inspiration.  At age 11, Panfili began studying in Vienna, Austria at the well-known Vienna Conservatory with Alexander Arenkow, a pupil of David Oistrach.  (None other than Dimitri Shostakovich worked with Arenkow on his late string quartets - Arenkow was the leader of the Glinka String Quartet.)  Three years later, she transferred to the University of Music and Performing Arts (in the same city) to begin studying with Christian Altenburger.  She was 14 years old.  By that time, Panfili had already made her professional debut, at age 12.  She had also already won a major violin competition in Italy, at age 10, the age at which it can be said she began her professional life.  By her late teens, she had already toured Europe, Russia, Japan, and Latin America.  She has stated that she likes uniqueness – if you see one of her YouTube videos, you will understand perfectly what that means.  Among the works in her extensive repertoire is Piazolla’s Four Seasons of Buenos Aires, a work full of extraordinary difficulties for the soloist as well as the orchestra.  Here is one of many YouTube videos with Panfili in a performance of Sarasate’s Gypsy Airs.  In addition to her solo career, Panfili leads a group of musicians known as Panfili and Friends which has its own schedule of concerts.  Panfili’s violin is one constructed (in 1927) by the French maker Rene Cunne (better known as Renato Conni.)  The photo is courtesy of StefanPanfili, photographer of (mostly) European Artists and Musicians.  

Susanne Lautenbacher

Susanne Lautenbacher is a German violinist and teacher born (in Augsburg) on April 19, 1932.  She is known for being an advocate of baroque music before it was in vogue.  She is also known for recording seldom heard works – the works of Locatelli, Biber, Rolla, Hummel, Viotti, Weill, Schorr, and Reger for example.  One of her early teachers was Karl Freund in Munich.  She later studied with Henryk Szeryng.  She recorded for many labels and her discography is fairly extensive – her recording activity spans more than forty years.  She was the violinist of the Bell’ Arte Trio as well.  She taught for many years (beginning in 1965) at the Stuttgart Conservatory. Here is an audio file of one of her recordings, a concerto by Antonio Vivaldi from the Four Seasons - Summer, taken at a very leisurely pace. Lautenbacher is becoming (or has already become) an iconic figure for her thoughtful, incisive, and engaging interpretations.  

Maurice Hasson

Maurice Hasson is a French violinist and teacher born on July 6, 1934.  He is recognized as a long-time violin professor at the Royal Academy of Music in London.  He is also known for having spent thirteen years of his music career in Venezuela (1960-1973), contributing greatly to that country’s cultural life.  He entered the Paris Conservatory in 1950.  He was 16 years old.  I do not know who his teachers were before his conservatory days.  After graduation, he studied privately with Polish violinist Henryk Szeryng.  In Venezuela, he taught at the University of the Andes, after which he relocated his career to England.  Though he has dedicated a great deal of time to teaching, he has also been very busy concertizing around the globe since the early 1960s.  He owned and played a 1727 Stradivarius for quite some time (the Halphen Strad, also known as the Benvenuti Strad) but now plays a Domenico Montagnana and a Guadagnini, although I don’t know the years of his current instruments.  It is said he also owns several other fine violins.  The 1727 Strad is now being played (though not owned) by Eckhard Seifert, a violinist with the Vienna Philharmonic.  Hasson made his American debut on January 19, 1978, playing Paganini's first concerto (in D) with the Cleveland Orchestra.  Lorin Maazel was on the podium.  Hasson has been teaching at the Royal Academy of Music since 1986.  He has approximately 20 CDs to his credit and has recorded most of the standard repertoire for various labels, including EMI, Philips, and Pickwick.  He is also known for master-classes all over the world.  Here is a fascinating YouTube video of him playing “Summer” from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons in 1987.  It is very interesting and very rare – apart from the brilliant performance – in that Yehudi Menuhin is the conductor.  You can marvel at how unobtrusive Menuhin was as a conductor.  The governments of France and Venezuela have bestowed several honors on Hasson in recognition of his service to their countries.  His best-known pupil is probably brilliant Dutch violinist Simone Lamsma.  Among his other pupils are Cassandra Hamilton, Catherine Geach, Gill Austin, Diana Yukawa, Amy Yuan, Marisol Lee, Tereza Privratska, Daniel Pioro, Laurence Kempton, Luis Cuevas, Mark Wilson, Nathaniel Anderson, Patrick Sabberton, Pierre Bensaid, Giovanni Guzzo, Remus Azoitei, and Eloisa-Fleur Thom.  

Gerard Poulet

Gerard Poulet is a French violinist and teacher born (in Bayonne) on August 12, 1938.  His father (Gaston Poulet), with whom he began his violin studies, was also a violinist.  His career has been mainly spent in Europe though he has performed in almost every continent.  He entered the Paris Conservatory at age 11 and graduated at age 12.  His main teacher there was Andre Asselin.  As did Bronislaw Huberman before him, he had many teachers: Zino Francescatti, Nathan Milstein, Yehudi Menuhin, and Henryk Szeryng were among them.  Poulet made his debut at age 12 playing the Mendelssohn concerto.  He recorded the third concerto of Mozart at age 14 with his father on the podium.  At age 18, he won the Paganini Competition in Genoa, Italy.  As do all winners of that competition, he got to play Paganini’s violin, the famous Cannone.  He later dedicated a good deal of time to teaching at the National Conservatory in Paris.  In 2007, he began teaching at the University of Arts in Tokyo.  He might not be there any longer since I could not locate his name on any faculty roster.  Poulet played the 1720 Henri Marteau Guarnerius from 1975 until about 1988 and that violin is supposedly now owned by Maxim Vengerov, though I could not find a single public source to confirm that.  His most famous pupils are most probably Renaud Capucon and Vineta Sareika.  

Charles Munch

Charles Munch was a French violinist, conductor, and teacher born (in Strasbourg, when it was German territory) on September 26, 1891.  Today, nobody remembers him as a violinist.  Although he conducted many great orchestras, he is best known for his tenure at the Boston Symphony, from 1949 to 1962.  He first studied violin at the Strasbourg Conservatory (inaugurated in 1855.)  His first job as a violinist was in an orchestra conducted by his father (an organist), playing in the second violin section.  In 1912, at age 20, he graduated from the conservatory and moved on to Berlin for further study with Carl Flesch.  He also studied with Lucien Capet at the Paris Conservatory.  In 1920, he was appointed professor of violin at the Strasbourg Conservatory while he was also playing as assistant concertmaster of the Strasbourg Philharmonic.  He was 29 years old.  Later on, he was concertmaster of the Gurzenich Orchestra in Cologne.  (The Gurzenich Orchestra is really not to be trifled with.  It played the world premieres of Brahms’ Double Concerto (1887), Strauss’ Till (1895), Strauss’ Don Quixote (1898), Mahler’s Third Symphony (1902), Mahler’s Fifth Symphony (1904), and Max Reger’s Variations (1907.)  He then served as concertmaster of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra (1926 to 1933) under Bruno Walter.  In 1933, he left Germany for Paris.  He had already made his conducting debut there in November, 1932.  He was 41 years old at the time of his debut.  As far as I know, after 1933, he never again touched the violin in public.  In 1938, he helped found the Paris Philharmonic.  He had already begun teaching conducting at the Paris Conservatory (1937-1945.)  During the war years (1939-1945), he conducted the Paris Conservatory Orchestra.  For this, he was later accused of being a Nazi collaborator, though the charge did not stick.  The Boston Symphony he first conducted in December, 1946.  His legacy with the Boston Symphony is well-known and documented in dozens of recordings.  Heifetz recorded the Beethoven concerto with Munch and the Boston Symphony in November of 1955.  I don’t think Heifetz recorded it ever again.  If Munch ever recorded anything as a violinist I don’t know where that recording might be found.  After 1962, Munch conducted European orchestras and guest conducted all over the world.  He once owned (from 1925 to 1960) a violin which had been stolen from Eugene Ysaye in Russia - a 1734 Stradivarius - which had been earlier played by Hugo Heermann.  That violin ended up with Henryk Szeryng who left it to the City of Jerusalem who then let the Israel Philharmonic borrow it.  He died on November 6, 1968, in Richmond, Virginia, at age 77.  Here is one of his many YouTube videos. 

Robert Virovai

Robert Virovai is a Hungarian concert violinist born (in Duravar, Yugoslavia) on March 10, 1921.  Except for this blog profile, he is today almost totally forgotten.  He began his violin studies with his mother at age 6.  By age 8, he was studying at the Belgrade Conservatory with Peter Stojanovich, a Serbian violinist, teacher, and composer.  He spent four years there.  He then studied, from the age of 13, with Jeno Hubay at the Budapest Conservatory.  Hubay later said of him, “Virovai plays so beautifully as to astonish even me.”  Some sources say Hubay declared him his best pupil.  He lived in New York City for a while but later spent most of his career in Europe.  He made his U.S. debut (playing a rented Stradivarius) on November 3, 1938, at age 17, with the New York Philharmonic.  He played Vieuxtemps’ Fourth Concerto in d minor (Opus 31) and all critics agreed he was sensational, one of them declaring that “his attack was positively ferocious.”  He later played a solo recital at Carnegie Hall on December 17 of the same year.  Virovai was soon placed among the front ranks of violinists.  It was said that his playing was “remarkable for speed, accuracy, and beautiful tone.”  He toured the U.S. for two or three years after that, playing with the most important orchestras.  Then he dropped out of sight, spending most of his time in Europe.  As far as I know, he has never commercially recorded anything, though that would be extremely unusual since recording technology had a progressive surge in the 1950s when Virovai would have been in his thirties.  Most violinists reach their apogee between thirty and fifty years of age.  Why there is no record of a discography is a mystery.  Perhaps I just don’t know where to look.  Later on, Virovai played and taught in Switzerland, where he now lives.  As a youth, Virovai was fluent in four languages – German, Hungarian, Croatian, and Slovenian.  Perhaps today, he is fluent in a few more. 

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. 

Henryk Szeryng

Henryk Szeryng was an extraordinary Polish violinist, teacher, and composer born on September 22, 1918 (Heifetz was 17 years old.) He began his violin studies at age 7 with Maurice Frenkel and, after his prodigious talent was recognized, continued with Carl Flesch in Germany (1929-1932) and Thibaud in Paris later on. He made a sensational debut in Warsaw in 1933 (in his early teens) and started concertizing right away, even while continuing further studies. In 1937, he graduated from the Paris Conservatory. During the Second World War, Szeryng served as an interpreter but also played more than 300 concerts for the Allied troops. In 1946, he became a naturalized Mexican citizen in appreciation for Mexico's efforts to take in several thousand Polish war refugees. He was the only violinist who travelled on a diplomatic passport after he was appointed Ambassador for Cultural Affairs by the Mexican Government. While continuing to concertize internationally, he taught at the National Conservatory in Mexico City for many years. It is not clear to me whether he was fluent in six, seven, or eight languages - there are varying accounts. In addition to being a virtuoso of the highest caliber, he was a great humanitarian and philanthropist. There is insufficient space here to post even a few of this phenomenal violinist's accomplishments. I must therefore refer you to his official website. There are many, many recordings by this artist (among them 2 sets of the Bach Sonatas and Partitas) and several videos on YouTube. As far as I know, he was one of only four concert violinists who played three concerti in a single program - Yehudi Menuhin, Raymond Cohen, and Szymon Goldberg were the other three.  One thing which is not well known is that Szeryng also composed concertos and chamber music. Among his violins, his favorite seems to have been the famous LeDuc Guarnerius Del Gesu. He also owned a copy of the Messiah Stradivarius (by Vuillaume, who made many copies of that instrument.) His King David Stradivarius was bequeathed to the State of Israel. Szeryng died unexpectedly on March 8, 1988  at age 70. Heifetz died one year earlier.

Itzhak Perlman

Itzhak Perlman is an Israeli violinist, teacher, and conductor born on August 31, 1945 (Heifetz was 43 years old.) He is at the forefront of virtuosos (Zukerman, Kremer, Mullova, Wha Chung, Midori, Laredo, Accardo, Fodor, etc.) who came after the early Twentieth Century era of violinists – Kreisler, Milstein, Gitlis, Heifetz, Elman, Szeryng, Zimbalist, Oistrakh, Kogan, Haendel, Francescatti, Ricci, Ferras, Stern, Grumiaux and others. In addition to a golden tone and an impressive, seemingly effortless technique, he is known for having a good bass voice and a charismatic stage presence. He first took up the violin at age 5 while living in Tel Aviv, Israel. He came to the U.S. in 1958. Winning a scholarship, Perlman attended the Juilliard School of Music (New York) where his teachers were Ivan Galamian and Dorothy Delay. Today, he teaches in their place. His U.S. debut (at Carnegie Hall) took place in 1963 and Perlman has been concertizing, recording, and making television appearances ever since. In addition, as most concert artists of today do, he frequently plays chamber music. His conducting work is mostly done with the Detroit Symphony and the Westchester Philharmonic. Perlman has a profile page on MySpace and YouTube features lots of videos of his playing. A particular favorite of viewers is the Handel Halvorsen Passacaglia (with Pinchas Zukerman on viola.) Perlman plays the Soil Stradivarius of 1714, previously owned by Yehudi Menuhin.

Ivry Gitlis

Ivry Gitlis is a Russian violinist, composer, actor, writer, and teacher born on August 22, 1922 (Heifetz was 21 years old.) He received his first violin at the age of five and gave his first concert at age ten. After graduating from the Paris Conservatory, he studied with Carl Flesch, Georges Enesco and Jacques Thibaud, among others – almost the same teachers under whom Henryk Szeryng studied a few years before him. After the Second World War, he made his European debut at the Royal Albert Hall. In 1951, he made his debut in Paris – which was later to become his main residence - and has since gone on to give concerts all over the world. His first recording, Alban Berg’s violin concerto, won the Grand Prix du Disque (Grand Record Prize) in France. Subsequent recordings, many of which until their recent re-releases had become sought-after collectors’ items, have included the concertos of Paganini, Tchaikovsky, Mendelssohn, Stravinsky, Bruch, Sibelius, Wieniawski, and Bartok. Gitlis is also a renowned pedagogue giving master classes all over Europe and beyond, regularly spending summers at the Mozarteum in Salzburg and in France where he has created memorable festivals. In 2001 he was one of the featured commentators in Bruno Monsaingeon’s film, “The Art of the Violin”. Tony Palmer’s 2004 film on Ivry Gitlis was premiered at the Prague Spring Music Festival where it was lauded by the Oscar-winning director Andrea Anderman as "the best artist's profile I have ever seen". And, most recently, he was honored in 2004 as part of the Festival devoted to great violinists of the 20th century, at the Louvre Museum in Paris. Gitlis has lived in Paris since the end of the sixties. His immense impact on the art of violin playing cannot be measured and his unique personality and extraordinary, deeply felt interpretations, many of which can be seen or heard on YouTube are a testament to the great man and artist. The depth of his expressive powers can hardly be exaggerated. You can judge for yourself here and here.  He plays the "Swan Song" Stradivarius of 1737 (the year of Stradivari’s death.)

Emil Mlynarski

Emil Szymon Młynarski was a Polish violinist, conductor, composer, and teacher. He was born on July 18, 1870 (Brahms was 37 years old.) He became Artur Rubinstein’s father-in-law when his daughter married Rubinstein in 1932 – her second marriage. Mlynarski was also one of Leopold Auer’s and Rimski-Korsakov’s not-so-well-known students. He was one of the founders, in 1901, of the Warsaw Philharmonic, which he conducted until 1905. From 1910 to 1916 he was principal conductor of the Scottish Orchestra (which became the Scottish National Orchestra in 1950 and then the Royal Scottish National Orchestra in 1991.) Among his compositions are a symphony and two violin concertos which are seldom heard. However, his second violin concerto has been recorded by English violinist Nigel Kennedy. Emil Młynarski died in Warsaw on April 5, 1935, at age 64, about four and a half years before the start of the Second World War.

Iona Brown

Iona Brown (Elizabeth Iona Brown) was an English violinist and conductor born on January 7, 1941 (Heifetz was 40 years old and would live another 46 years.) Her early studies were in London with Hugh Maguire. She later studied with Henryk Szeryng as well. From 1963 to 1966, Brown was a member of the Philharmonia Orchestra and played in the Cremona String Quartet. In 1964, she joined the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, and became a soloist and director in 1974. There are many recordings of her playing with this orchestra. She left the Academy in 1980. In 1981, Brown was appointed artistic director of the Norwegian Chamber Orchestra. She also served as music director of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra from 1987 to 1992. In 1998, Brown gave up the violin entirely (due to problems with arthritis) and dedicated herself to conducting. She died on June 5, 2004 at age 63.

Henryk Szeryng

Henryk Szeryng was an extraordinary Polish violinist born on September 22, 1918. He owned the violin whose picture is shown in the previous blog. He began his violin studies at age 7 and, after his prodigious talent was recognized, continued with Carl Flesch in Germany (1929) and Jacques Thibaud in Paris later on. He made a sensational debut in 1933 (in his early teens) and started concertizing right away, even while continuing further studies. In 1946, he became a naturalized Mexican citizen in appreciation of Mexico's efforts to take in several thousand Polish war refugees. He was the only violinist who travelled on a diplomatic passport after he was appointed Ambassador for Cultural Affairs by the Mexican Government. It is not clear to me whether he was fluent in six, seven, or eight languages. There are varying accounts. In addition to being a virtuoso of the highest caliber, he was a great humanitarian and philanthropist. There is insufficient space and time to post even a few of this phenomenal violinist's accomplishments here. I must therefore refer you to his wonderful, official website - henrykszeryng.net. There are many, many recordings by this great artist and several amazing videos on YouTube. One thing which is not well known is that he also composed concertos and chamber music. He died unexpectedly on March 3, 1988, at age 69.

Leduc

I am not certain but I think this violin is now in the hands of the concertmaster of the National Symphony in Mexico City. It could also be in Israel. What do I know? Nothing. It is a nice violin though. It was owned by the late Henryk Szeryng, the Polish violinist. He made his home in Mexico and elsewhere. Guarneri was, of course, a pretty good maker of violins. He made this one in 1743 - some say 1745. It makes no difference - it sounds good. Stradivari was dead by then and he was a good maker as well. I do not know if either one actually knew how to play.