Oscar Shumsky

Oscar Shumsky was a Russian (most people would say American) violinist, violist, conductor, and teacher born (in Philadelphia) on March 23, 1917.  He had a long and busy career during which he almost completely stopped concertizing in favor of teaching.  It has been said that Otokar Sevcik had over 5,000 students over the span of a greater-than sixty-year teaching career.  Shumsky had lots of students but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t more than five thousand.  It has also been said of Shumsky that he had an un-compromising, opinionated personality – in the style of Berl Senofsky.  Shumsky began to study the violin at age three - one source says age 4 - with Albert Meiff.  He first appeared with orchestra at age seven with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Leopold Stokowski on the podium, playing Mozart’s fifth concerto – known as the Turkish concerto.  At age 8 he began to study privately with Leopold Auer in New York.  Three years later (1928) he entered the Curtis Institute where he continued to study with Auer and later on (beginning in 1930) with Efrem Zimbalist.  He made his New York debut in 1934.  He was 17 years old.  He graduated from Curtis in 1936 but continued to study privately with Zimbalist until 1938.  He joined the NBC Symphony under the ill-tempered conductor Arturo Toscanini in 1939.  He was the youngest member of the orchestra and sat in the second stand of the first violins.  That same year, he also joined the Primrose Quartet as first violinist – William Primrose was also a member of the NBC Symphony.  At the time, many top-flight New York musicians had become members of either the NBC Symphony or the New York Philharmonic because solo work was scarce.  From 1941, he served in the Navy, playing as one of the orchestral soloists and playing in the Navy string quartet with cellist Bernard Greenhouse, violist Emanuel Vardi, and David Stone (please see comments below).  After the war, Shumsky was featured on weekly radio programs on NBC, as were a few other violinists of the time.  However, a very reliable source says that this broadcast activity actually occurred in 1939, before the war.  It may have been both, before and after.  Whether any of those programs survive in recordings is anybody’s guess.  Shumsky also worked as a studio musician, leading the RCA and the Columbia Symphonies as concertmaster on various occasions.  Shumsky taught at the Curtis Institute (1961 to 1965), the Peabody Conservatory (from 1942), Yale University (from 1975), and the Juilliard School (from 1953.)  I do not know how long he taught at each particular school.  On December 15, 1956, he appeared with the New York Philharmonic playing the Beethoven concerto.  Leonard Bernstein was on the podium.  Shumsky made his conducting debut in 1959.  As far as I know, he never conducted any major orchestras.  His commercial discography includes Rode’s 24 Caprices, Beethoven’s concerto, Brahms’ concerto, two Mozart concertos (4 and 5), three Bach concertos, the Glazunov concerto, the complete Mozart Sonatas, the complete Brahms Hungarian Dances, and the Bach solo Partitas and Sonatas.  He also recorded with the Primrose Quartet and those recordings are still available.  Here is a YouTube video of one of his recorded performances.  It is the famous Richard Strauss sonata – the one responsible for the attack on Jascha Heifetz (which resulted in his broken arm.)  Glenn Gould is the accompanist.  Shumsky’s students include Steven Staryk, Stanley Ritchie, Guillermo Figueroa, and Ida Kavafian.  Among many other violins, Shumsky played (and owned) the 1715 Stradivarius known as the Pierre Rode Stradivarius.  The violin was inherited by Shumsky’s two sons who sold it to Tokuji Munetsugu in 2004.  According to at least one source, this violin was subsequently played (at least for a while) by Ryu Goto, brother of the famous violinist, Midori.  Shumsky died (in New York) on July 24, 2000, at age 83.  

Giovanni Giornovichi

Giovanni Giornovichi (Ivan Mane Jarnović) was a Croatian violinist, composer, and teacher born (in Palermo, Italy) on October 26, 1747.  He was a virtuoso violinist who was very well-known in his lifetime though completely forgotten today.  I would never have heard of him had it not been for the short blog about George Bridgetower which I wrote immediately preceding this blog.  He was one of Bridgetower’s teachers in England.  One source states that his full name (i.e. first and last name) - other than in the birth certificate for a daughter born in London in 1795 - did not appear in any document or program during his lifetime, not even in his published works.  The first reference work to actually publish his first name was published in 1840.  Another oddity about him is that his surname appears to have had at least nine different spellings.  Perhaps he purposely desired to be known – or publicize himself - by a single name, such as other artists have since then, including Midori, Liberace, Houdini, Prince, and Madonna.  Who knows?  It is believed that he studied with Antonio Lolli in Italy and that his ancestry derived from Dubrovnik, Croatia.  It is documented that he made a very successful debut in Paris on March 25, 1773 – he was 25 years old.  His playing was described as being brilliant, amazing, and elegant.  Subsequently, his appearances all over Europe (but especially in England and France) received great acclaim.  Among the cities he toured and played in were London, Edinburgh, Dublin, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Warsaw, Stockholm, and St Petersburg.  He also shared the stage with musicians who are now legendary, including Joseph Haydn.  It is known that from 1779 to 1783 he worked for a member of the aristocracy in Prussia.  From 1883 to 1886 he was employed by Empress Catherine II of Russia.  From 1790 until 1796 he lived in England.  He took to touring again from 1797 to 1802.  Then he moved permanently to St Petersburg where he died (while playing billiards) on November 23, 1804, at age 57.  He composed over 70 works, 22 violin concertos among them – music which is now almost never played.  Nonetheless, the Starling Chamber Orchestra can be heard in three of the concertos at Instant Encore’s website here.  They have recorded three CDs featuring Giornovichi’s violin concertos.

Midori

Midori (Midori Goto) is a Japanese (some would say American) violinist, teacher, and writer, born on October 25, 1971 (Perlman was 25 years old.) She began violin lessons with her mother at age three. Her first public performance took place at age seven. After she and her mother came to the U.S. (1982), she began studying at Juilliard with Dorothy Delay. Her New York debut took place with the New York Philharmonic under Zubin Mehta that same year. She has been concertizing ever since. YouTube features a popular home video of her performance at Tanglewood (1986) when her E string broke twice while she played. In 2000, she graduated from New York University, having earned a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology and again in 2005 a Master’s Degree in the same field from the same school. Nowadays, Midori spends a lot of time teaching - she has founded several educational programs for children. She has also taught at USC (Los Angeles - Heifetz used to teach there) and the Manhattan School of Music, among other schools, and is the recipient of several prestigious awards. However, her discography is not extensive and she has yet to record (or release) the Beethoven and the Brahms concertos, two war horses of the violin repertory. She wrote a memoir (Simply Midori) which was published in 2004. She has played (and perhaps still plays) the famous 1734 Huberman Guarnerius. A wonderful CD  and DVD of her Carnegie Hall recital (1990) are still available. Here is a sample from the DVD posted on YouTube.