Stefan Milenkovich

Stefan Milenkovich (Milenkovic) is a Serbian violinist and teacher born (in Belgrade) on January 25, 1977.  He began studying at an extremely young age – age 3, just like Jascha Heifetz.  His first teacher was his father – again, just as Heifetz’ father was his first teacher as well.  As have other famous violinists – Bronislaw Huberman, Bronislaw Gimpel, Leonora Jackson, Julia Igonina, Hilary Hahn, Natasha Korsakova, and Chloe Hanslip among them - he has performed for world leaders, including President Reagan, President Gorbachev, and Pope John Paul II.  By age 6, he had already given his first public concert.  By 1994, he had played over 1000 concerts.  He was only 16 years old.  Ruggiero Ricci played over 5000 concerts by the time he retired at age 85.  That is probably a world record, although I am not sure about that.  At the rate he was going, Milenkovich would have to play until age 57 before he would surpass the 5000 number; however, few concert artists nowadays play more than 50 concerts per season.  Also in that year (1994), Milenkovic graduated from the University of Belgrade.  He then began studying in New York with Dorothy Delay at Juilliard.  In 2003, he began teaching at that same school.  He was 26 years old.  All the while, he was concertizing all over the world.  He has been known to dance - in the fashion of Maxim Vengerov - during special recitals.  Three other violinists that I know of are (or were) also very good dancers; Jean Marie Leclair,  Andrew Sords, and Tai Murray.  As does Simone Lamsma, Milenkovich loves violin competitions and has won a number of them or placed in the top three, including the Indianapolis, the Queen Elizabeth, the Yehudi Menuhin, the Paganini, and the Spohr competitions.  He has recorded several CDs which are easy to find on the internet.  Currently he teaches at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana (about 130 miles south of Chicago) and at the University of Belgrade (since December 26, 2011.)  Here is one of many YouTube videos of him – it features Sarasate’s Zigeunerweisen. Milenkovich currently plays a modern violin - a 2006 violin by Chicago luthier Peter Aznavoorian.  

Julian Sitkovetsky

Julian Sitkovetsky (Yulian Sitkovetsky) was a Russian (Ukrainian) violinist born (in Kiev) on November 7, 1925 (Heifetz was 24 years old and already living in the U.S.  Leonid Kogan was a one-year-old child.)  He is remembered mostly for having lived a very short life and for being the father of Dmitry Sitkovetsky, violinist and conductor, and the husband of pianist Bella Davidovich.  He was a prodigy, starting violin lessons at age 4 with his father, then continuing with David Bertie at the Central School in Kiev (Ukraine.)  At age nine, he played the Mendelssohn concerto with the Kiev Symphony.  In 1939, at age 14, he enrolled in the class of Abram Yampolsky (teacher of Leonid Kogan and a well-known Russian pedagogue, though not as celebrated as Eduard Grach, Zakhar Bron, Leopold Auer, or Peter Stolyarsky) at the Moscow Central Music School.  In 1947, in a three-way tie, he won first prize in the Prague Festival violin competition.  The other two winners were Kogan and Igor Bezrodny.  In 1952, he took second prize in the Wieniawski Competition – David Oistrakh took first.  Again, in 1955, he came in second (to Berl Senofsky) in the Queen Elizabeth Competition.  Yehudi Menuhin and David Oistrakh (both of whom were judges in the competition) later said they thought he had been robbed of the first prize.  Later, David Oistrakh himself was quoted (by Joseph Magil of American Record Guide) as saying that, had he lived, Sitkovetsky would have eclipsed both him and Kogan.  Magil stated that “Sitkovetsky had a broad, firm, focused tone in all registers; flawless intonation; a rapid, even trill; a swift, perfectly controlled staccato; strong, immaculate harmonics; and an even, clear sautillé."  He forgot to mention the natural, intuitive sense of rubato and phrasing for which fellow musicians admired him.  CDs of his recordings (live and studio) are not hard to find on the internet.  YouTube has several audio files of his playing, one of which you can listen to (this one is Paganini’s Le Streghe variations based on a melody [The Witches or Magic Sisters] by Franz Sussmayer, Mozart’s pupil, but arranged by Kreisler, who harmonizes it in his own way [as usual] featuring some very clearly articulated left hand pizzicatos – Bella Davidovich on piano.)  Sitkovetsky played a Vincenzo Panormo violin (also known as Vincenzo Trusiano) for a long time.  That violin is now being played by Julia Igonina, Russian concert violinist and first violinist of the New Russian Quartet.  Toward the end of his life, Sitkovetsky played a Stradivarius, on loan from the USSR State Collection.  He died (not unexpectedly) on February 23, 1958, at age 32. 

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) 

New Russian Quartet

The New Russian Quartet is the resident string quartet of the Moscow Conservatory.  Established in January, 2008, it is already one of the world's best string quartets. Its members are also all graduates of the Conservatory.  It is more or less the equivalent of the Juilliard Quartet in the U.S.  Julia Igonina is the quartet's first violinist, Elena Kharitonova plays second violin, Alexander Galkovsky is the violist, and Alexey Steblev is the cellist.  Except for Julia Igonina, who is actually a brilliant concert violinist, they are all seasoned chamber music players.  As their website indicates, the name of the ensemble implies that the musicians  remain faithful to the Russian performing tradition as they also explore uncharted areas in chamber music.   Their core repertoire consists of the standard literature by Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Borodin, Bartok and all the rest but they also perform contemporary works composed specifically for them.  They have collaborated with such outstanding artists as Jessie Norman, Vladimir Spivakov, Alexander Rudin, Yuri Bashmet, and Shlomo Mintz (playing viola.)  The New Russian Quartet frequently performs in Russia’s best concert venues and participates in music festivals throughout Europe and Asia.  As far as I know, they have not yet toured the U.S.  The members of the quartet perform on Italian instruments from the Russian State's collection.  They also have many superlative videos on YouTube.