Description

ISSAY MITNITZKY (KIEV, FEBRUARY 4, 1887 – BROMMA, OCTOBER 9, 1976)

 

 

 

 

Mitnitzky studied at the Kiev Conservatory of Music and under František Ondříček in Vienna and at the Scharwenka Conservatory in Berlin. He made extensive concert tours in Germany, Austria , Hungary , Italy , Switzerland , Poland , Scandinavia and the United States and won considerable recognition. The Nordic tours in particular he often undertook together with his brother-in-law the pianist Olof Wibergh. Mitnitzky became a Swedish citizen in 1920. He composed, among other things, pieces for violin and piano and a fantasy for violin and orchestra.

Mitnitzky is buried at the Northern Cemetery in Stockholm.

 

 

 

MIKHAIL WOLF-ISRAEL (ST. PETERSBURG, 22 JUNE 1870 – KYIV, 24 DECEMBER, 1934)

 

 

 

 

He was born on 10 [22] June 1870 in St. Petersburg. In 1890 he graduated from the St Petersburg Conservatoire, where he studied violin with Leopold Auer (previously he had studied with Pyotr Krasnokutsky).

Between 1892 and 1912 he worked as a concertmaster of the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra in St Petersburg. From 1913 he performed as a solo violinist and conductor in Rybinsk and Voronezh.

From the mid-1920s, he lived in Kyiv, where he worked as a concertmaster and conductor at the Kyiv Opera and Ballet Theatre. In 1926-1932, he led a string quartet at the All-Ukrainian Society of Revolutionary Musicians. He taught at the Kyiv Conservatory. He died in Kyiv on 24 December 1934.

 

 

 

ROBERT POLLAK (VIENNA, 18 JANUARY, 1880 – BRUNNEN, 7 SEPTEMBER, 1962)

 

 

 

 

Pollak’s parents were Cölestine (née Pereles, 1849/50, † 1921 in Vienna) and Julius (1848, † 1881 in Vienna; occupation: merchant) Pollak; his sister Irene Seidner (1880 in Vienna, † 1959 in Los Angeles) became an actress.

Pollak studied with Johann Ritter at the Conservatorium of the Society of Friends of Music in Vienna, then from 1901 to 1903 with Hans Sitt at the Leipzig Conservatory , and finally from 1903 to 1905 with Henri Marteau at the Geneva Conservatory of Music. He taught there from 1905 to 1914, and from 1912 onward, he also gave violin masterclasses at the Lausanne Conservatory. At the outbreak of the First World War, he was in Russia and was interned as a Russian civilian prisoner in Astrakhan and Saratov, but after the October Revolution, he received a professorship at the Moscow Conservatory from 1917 to 1919. From 1919 until 1926, Pollak led the masterclass at the New Vienna Conservatory, succeeding František Ondříček. In 1924, he became first violinist of the Vienna Buxbaum Quartet (with Friedrich Buxbaum, Ernst Morawec, and Max Starkmann). From 1926 to 1930, Pollak taught at the San Francisco Conservatory and was first violinist of the California String Quartet (with William Walski, Roman Verne, and Michel Penja). From 1930 to 1936, he led the violin masterclass at the Imperial Academy of Music in Tokyo and conducted the New Symphony Orchestra there on several occasions . In 1937, Pollak moved to Hollywood and taught at Chapman College in Los Angeles from 1937 to 1940, finally teaching at the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music from 1940 onward. He became an American citizen in 1943.

As a violin soloist, Pollak undertook concert tours throughout Europe, Asia, and North America. His most famous students were Bronisław Gimpel, Nikolai Berezovsky, and Isaac Stern.

 

 

 

DAVID HOCHSTEIN (ROCHESTER, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES, FEBRUARY 16, 1892 – FOREST OF ARGONNE, FRANCE, OCTOBER 12, 1918)

 

 

 

 

Helena Zodokoff and Jacob Hochstein were both Russian Jews who had fled their home country; they met for the first time in Rochester. Jacob was said to be fluent in six languages. Helena, born in 1860, was the elder half-sister of future anarchist Emma Goldman, with whom she arrived in Rochester on January 1, 1886, joining their sister Lena and her husband.

Jacob and Helena were married in 1888. Their son David, born in 1892, demonstrated an aptitude for music from infancy, according to his father. For his fifth birthday, David received his first violin, a gift from his father, who became the boy’s first instructor.

Around 1902, David Hochstein was playing his violin at the home of a friend, the future superintendent of New York State Police John Adams Warner, son of the architect J. Foster Warner. Emily Sibley Watson, a patron of the arts, lived next door to the Warners and heard Hochstein’s playing. Watson, who was the daughter of Western Union president Hiram Sibley, recognized Hochstein’s talent and took it upon herself to fund his further education both at home and abroad.

With Watson as benefactor, Hochstein studied under Otakar Ševčík in Vienna and later Leopold Auer in Saint Petersburg. By 1914, Watson had prevailed upon George Eastman, the photography magnate who was Rochester’s most influential philanthropist and artistic patron, to loan a pair of violins to Hochstein. One of the violins was a 1715 Stradivarius; the other was a 1760 Landolfi. Hochstein began playing across the United States and Europe, making his Carnegie Hall debut in 1915. By this time, it was clear Hochstein was a rising star and destined for greatness. He made his only recordings for Emerson Records in early 1917, of Fritz Kreisler’s “Liebesleid”, Cesar Cui’s “Orientale”, and his own arrangement of a waltz in A major by Johannes Brahms.

By the time World War I began, Jacob Hochstein had died, and David was the sole support for his mother. His aunt, Goldman, warned him away from enlisting in the military, but Hochstein was torn. He was no fan of the war, but he felt a responsibility to his country and some guilt about using his talents to avoid making the same sacrifices as his peers. He initially received a hardship exemption from military service, due to his mother being widowed, but thought better of it and had the exemption rescinded. He joined the United States Army in October 1917 and specifically requested assignment to a combat unit.

Nonetheless, he continued playing while he was in the service. The last time Hochstein played the Stradivarius was March 8, 1918, at a recital attended by Margaret Woodrow Wilson, daughter of the President, at Camp Upton on Long Island. The next day, during a trip by the Camp’s vaudeville troupe to Rockville Center, the bus carrying the troupe broke down and crashed. There were no injuries, but the violin ended up in pieces. Hochstein returned to Rochester with the violin, where Eastman apparently arranged for its repair; the violin has been recorded as in the possession of John Friedrich & Brothers in New York City by 1919, and since 1959 as in the ownership of virtuoso Steven Staryk.

Hochstein was killed in October 1918 in the Forest of Argonne, a casualty of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive in France, the last major Allied offensive of the war. Helena Hochstein died within the year.

 

 

TRACKLIST

 

 

1. Issay Mitnitzky Gavotte (Gossek-Burmester) Lyrophon 15287
2. Issay Mitnitzky Hungarian Dance No. 2 in D (Brahms) Columbia
3. Issay Mitnitzky Madrigale (Simonetti) Lyrophon 15288
4. Issay Mitnitzky Maria Wiegenlied (Reger-Barmas) Columbia DN 245 WN 474
5. Issay Mitnitzky Waltz Op. 39, No. 15 (Brahms) Columbia
6. Mikhail Wolf-Israel Faust (Gounod) Salut demeure Gavriil A. Morskoy (tenor) Berliner 22552 321x
7. Mikhail Wolf-Israel Nocturne, Op. 56 No. 4 Feodor Stepanov (flute) (Cui) G&T 28000 274x
8. Mikhail Wolf-Israel Scherzino (Cesar Cui) Feodor Stepanov (flute) Berliner 28020 1485B
9. Mikhail Wolf-Israel Serenade (Braga) Maria Michailova (soprano) G&T 23474 2851L
10. Mikhail Wolf-Israel The Spanish Dance (Sarasate) G&T 27932 270x
11. Robert Pollak Air on the G string (Bach) Paul Rosenstand (piano) Columbia 27800-A (38481)
12. Robert Pollak Swan Bee (Saint-Saëns) Paul Rosenstand (piano) Columbia 27800-B (38480)
13. David Hochstein Waltz Op 39, No 15 (Brahms) Emerson 7147