Nathan Milstein
Encyclopedia
Nathan Mironovich Milstein (December 21, 1992) was a Russia
n-born American virtuoso violinist.
Widely considered one of the finest violinists of the 20th century, Milstein was known for his interpretations of Bach's
solo violin works and for works from the Romantic
period. He was also known for his long career: he performed at a high level into his mid 80s, retiring only after suffering a broken hand.
, then part of the Russian Empire
(now in Ukraine
), the fourth child of seven, to a middle-class Jewish family with virtually no musical background. It was a concert by the 11-year-old Jascha Heifetz
that inspired his parents to make a violinist out of Milstein. As a child (of seven years old), he started violin studies (as suggested by his parents, to keep him out of mischief) with the eminent violin pedagogue Pyotr Stolyarsky, also the teacher of renowned violinist David Oistrakh
.
When Milstein was 11, Leopold Auer
invited him to become one of his students at the St. Petersburg Conservatory
. Milstein reminisced:
Milstein may in fact have been the last of the great Russian violinists to have had personal contact with Auer. Auer did not name Milstein in his memoirs but mentions "two boys from Odessa
... both of whom disappeared after I left St. Petersburg in June 1917." Neither is Milstein's name in the registry of the St Petersburg Conservatory.
Milstein also studied with Eugène Ysaÿe
in Belgium. He told film-maker
Christopher Nupen
, director of Nathan Milstein – A Portrait, that he learned almost nothing from Ysaÿe but enjoyed his company enormously. In a 1977 interview printed in High Fidelity, he said, "I went to Ysaÿe in 1926 but he never paid any attention to me. I think it might have been better this way. I had to think for myself."
Milstein met Vladimir Horowitz
and his pianist sister Regina in 1921 when he played a recital in Kiev
. They invited him for tea at their parents' home. Milstein later said, "I came for tea and stayed three years." Milstein and Horowitz performed together, as "children of the revolution," throughout the Soviet Union
and struck up a life-long friendship. In 1925, they went on a concert tour of Western Europe together.
He made his American debut in 1929 with Leopold Stokowski
and the Philadelphia Orchestra
. He eventually settled in New York and became an American citizen. He toured repeatedly throughout Europe, maintaining residences in London and Paris.
A transcriber and composer, Milstein arranged many works for violin and wrote his own cadenza
s for many concertos. He was obsessed with articulating each note perfectly and would often spend long periods of time working out fingerings which would make passages sound more articulated. One of his best known compositions is Paganiniana, a set of variations on various themes from the works of Niccolò Paganini
.
In 1948, his recording of Mendelssohn's
Violin Concerto in E minor
, with Bruno Walter
conducting the New York Philharmonic
, had the distinction of being the first catalogue item in Columbia's
newly introduced long-playing
twelve-inch 33 rpm vinyl
records, Columbia ML 4001.
He was awarded the Légion d'honneur
by France in 1968, and received a Grammy Award
for his recording of Bach's sonatas and partitas in 1975. He was also awarded Kennedy Center honors by US President
Ronald Reagan
.
A recital he gave in Stockholm in July 1986 proved to be his final performance. This recital was recorded in its in entirety and shows the remarkable condition of his technique at age 82. A fall shortly afterwards in which he severely broke his left hand ended his career.
After playing many different violins in his earlier days, Milstein finally acquired the 1716 "Goldman" Stradivari in 1945 which he used for the rest of his life. He re-named this Stradivari the "Maria Teresa" in honour of his daughter Maria (presently wife of Marchese GiovanAngelo Theodoli-Braschi, Duke of Nemi and Grandee of Spain, descendant from Pope Pius VI) and his wife Therese. He also performed on the 1710 ex-"Dancla" Stradivarius for a short period.
During the late 1980s, Milstein published his memoirs, From Russia to the West, in which he discussed his life of constant performance and socializing. Milstein discusses the personalities of important composers such as Alexander Glazunov
, Sergei Prokofiev
, Sergei Rachmaninoff
and Igor Stravinsky
and conductors such as Arturo Toscanini
and Leopold Stokowski, all of whom he knew personally. He also discusses his best friends, pianist Vladimir Horowitz, cellist Gregor Piatigorsky
and ballet director George Balanchine
, as well as other violinists such as Fritz Kreisler
and David Oistrakh
. Milstein also expressed his generally conservative, strongly anti-communist and anti-Soviet political beliefs. Milstein said that President Kennedy was a weak leader, admired President Reagan, and stated that he refused to return to the Soviet Union, even for a tour sponsored by the United States.
Milstein was married twice, remaining married to his second wife, Therese, until his death. He died of a heart attack in London on December 21, 1992, just three weeks before his 89th birthday.
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n-born American virtuoso violinist.
Widely considered one of the finest violinists of the 20th century, Milstein was known for his interpretations of Bach's
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
solo violin works and for works from the Romantic
Romantic music
Romantic music or music in the Romantic Period is a musicological and artistic term referring to a particular period, theory, compositional practice, and canon in Western music history, from 1810 to 1900....
period. He was also known for his long career: he performed at a high level into his mid 80s, retiring only after suffering a broken hand.
Biography
He was born in OdessaOdessa
Odessa or Odesa is the administrative center of the Odessa Oblast located in southern Ukraine. The city is a major seaport located on the northwest shore of the Black Sea and the fourth largest city in Ukraine with a population of 1,029,000 .The predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement,...
, then part of the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
(now in Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
), the fourth child of seven, to a middle-class Jewish family with virtually no musical background. It was a concert by the 11-year-old Jascha Heifetz
Jascha Heifetz
Jascha Heifetz was a violinist, born in Vilnius, then Russian Empire, now Lithuania. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest violinists of all time.- Early life :...
that inspired his parents to make a violinist out of Milstein. As a child (of seven years old), he started violin studies (as suggested by his parents, to keep him out of mischief) with the eminent violin pedagogue Pyotr Stolyarsky, also the teacher of renowned violinist David Oistrakh
David Oistrakh
David Fyodorovich Oistrakh , , David Fiodorović Ojstrakh, ; – October 24, 1974, was a Soviet violinist....
.
When Milstein was 11, Leopold Auer
Leopold Auer
Leopold Auer was a Hungarian violinist, teacher, conductor and composer.-Early life and career:...
invited him to become one of his students at the St. Petersburg Conservatory
Saint Petersburg Conservatory
The N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov Saint Petersburg State Conservatory is a music school in Saint Petersburg. In 2004, the conservatory had around 275 faculty members and 1,400 students.-History:...
. Milstein reminisced:
Every little boy who had the dream of playing better than the other boy wanted to go to Auer. He was a very gifted man and a good teacher. I used to go to the Conservatory twice a week for classes. I played every lesson with forty or fifty people sitting and listening. Two pianos were in the classroom and a pianist accompanied us. When Auer was sick, he would ask me to come to his home.
Milstein may in fact have been the last of the great Russian violinists to have had personal contact with Auer. Auer did not name Milstein in his memoirs but mentions "two boys from Odessa
Odessa
Odessa or Odesa is the administrative center of the Odessa Oblast located in southern Ukraine. The city is a major seaport located on the northwest shore of the Black Sea and the fourth largest city in Ukraine with a population of 1,029,000 .The predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement,...
... both of whom disappeared after I left St. Petersburg in June 1917." Neither is Milstein's name in the registry of the St Petersburg Conservatory.
Milstein also studied with Eugène Ysaÿe
Eugène Ysaÿe
Eugène Ysaÿe was a Belgian violinist, composer and conductor born in Liège. He was regarded as "The King of the Violin", or, as Nathan Milstein put it, the "tzar"...
in Belgium. He told film-maker
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...
Christopher Nupen
Christopher Nupen
Christopher Nupen is a South African-born filmmaker based in the United Kingdom specialising in biographical documentaries of musicians.Nupen was born in South Africa to a family of Norwegian descent — his father, E. P...
, director of Nathan Milstein – A Portrait, that he learned almost nothing from Ysaÿe but enjoyed his company enormously. In a 1977 interview printed in High Fidelity, he said, "I went to Ysaÿe in 1926 but he never paid any attention to me. I think it might have been better this way. I had to think for myself."
Milstein met Vladimir Horowitz
Vladimir Horowitz
Vladimir Samoylovich Horowitz was a Russian-American classical virtuoso pianist and minor composer. His technique and use of tone color and the excitement of his playing were legendary. He is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century.-Life and early...
and his pianist sister Regina in 1921 when he played a recital in Kiev
Kiev
Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....
. They invited him for tea at their parents' home. Milstein later said, "I came for tea and stayed three years." Milstein and Horowitz performed together, as "children of the revolution," throughout the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
and struck up a life-long friendship. In 1925, they went on a concert tour of Western Europe together.
He made his American debut in 1929 with Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Anthony Stokowski was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski...
and the Philadelphia Orchestra
Philadelphia Orchestra
The Philadelphia Orchestra is a symphony orchestra based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States. One of the "Big Five" American orchestras, it was founded in 1900...
. He eventually settled in New York and became an American citizen. He toured repeatedly throughout Europe, maintaining residences in London and Paris.
A transcriber and composer, Milstein arranged many works for violin and wrote his own cadenza
Cadenza
In music, a cadenza is, generically, an improvised or written-out ornamental passage played or sung by a soloist or soloists, usually in a "free" rhythmic style, and often allowing for virtuosic display....
s for many concertos. He was obsessed with articulating each note perfectly and would often spend long periods of time working out fingerings which would make passages sound more articulated. One of his best known compositions is Paganiniana, a set of variations on various themes from the works of Niccolò Paganini
Niccolò Paganini
Niccolò Paganini was an Italian violinist, violist, guitarist, and composer. He was one of the most celebrated violin virtuosi of his time, and left his mark as one of the pillars of modern violin technique...
.
In 1948, his recording of Mendelssohn's
Mendelssohn
Mendelson is a Polish/German Jewish family name, meaning "son of Mendel", Mendel being a Yiddish diminutive of the Hebrew given name Menahem, meaning "consoling" or "one who consoles".Mendelssohn is the surname of a number of people:...
Violin Concerto in E minor
Violin Concerto (Mendelssohn)
Felix Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor, Op. 64 is his last large orchestral work. It forms an important part of the violin repertoire and is one of the most popular and most frequently performed violin concertos of all time...
, with Bruno Walter
Bruno Walter
Bruno Walter was a German-born conductor. He is considered one of the best known conductors of the 20th century. Walter was born in Berlin, but is known to have lived in several countries between 1933 and 1939, before finally settling in the United States in 1939...
conducting the New York Philharmonic
New York Philharmonic
The New York Philharmonic is a symphony orchestra based in New York City in the United States. It is one of the American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five"...
, had the distinction of being the first catalogue item in Columbia's
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
newly introduced long-playing
LP album
The LP, or long-playing microgroove record, is a format for phonograph records, an analog sound storage medium. Introduced by Columbia Records in 1948, it was soon adopted as a new standard by the entire record industry...
twelve-inch 33 rpm vinyl
Polyvinyl chloride
Polyvinyl chloride, commonly abbreviated PVC, is a thermoplastic polymer. It is a vinyl polymer constructed of repeating vinyl groups having one hydrogen replaced by chloride. Polyvinyl chloride is the third most widely produced plastic, after polyethylene and polypropylene. PVC is widely used in...
records, Columbia ML 4001.
He was awarded the Légion d'honneur
Légion d'honneur
The Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
by France in 1968, and received a Grammy Award
Grammy Award
A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for his recording of Bach's sonatas and partitas in 1975. He was also awarded Kennedy Center honors by US President
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
.
A recital he gave in Stockholm in July 1986 proved to be his final performance. This recital was recorded in its in entirety and shows the remarkable condition of his technique at age 82. A fall shortly afterwards in which he severely broke his left hand ended his career.
After playing many different violins in his earlier days, Milstein finally acquired the 1716 "Goldman" Stradivari in 1945 which he used for the rest of his life. He re-named this Stradivari the "Maria Teresa" in honour of his daughter Maria (presently wife of Marchese GiovanAngelo Theodoli-Braschi, Duke of Nemi and Grandee of Spain, descendant from Pope Pius VI) and his wife Therese. He also performed on the 1710 ex-"Dancla" Stradivarius for a short period.
During the late 1980s, Milstein published his memoirs, From Russia to the West, in which he discussed his life of constant performance and socializing. Milstein discusses the personalities of important composers such as Alexander Glazunov
Alexander Glazunov
Alexander Konstantinovich Glazunov was a Russian composer of the late Russian Romantic period, music teacher and conductor...
, Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...
, Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
and Igor Stravinsky
Igor Stravinsky
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ; 6 April 1971) was a Russian, later naturalized French, and then naturalized American composer, pianist, and conductor....
and conductors such as Arturo Toscanini
Arturo Toscanini
Arturo Toscanini was an Italian conductor. One of the most acclaimed musicians of the late 19th and 20th century, he was renowned for his intensity, his perfectionism, his ear for orchestral detail and sonority, and his photographic memory...
and Leopold Stokowski, all of whom he knew personally. He also discusses his best friends, pianist Vladimir Horowitz, cellist Gregor Piatigorsky
Gregor Piatigorsky
Gregor Piatigorsky was a Russian-born American cellist.-Early life:...
and ballet director George Balanchine
George Balanchine
George Balanchine , born Giorgi Balanchivadze in Saint Petersburg, Russia, to a Georgian father and a Russian mother, was one of the 20th century's most famous choreographers, a developer of ballet in the United States, co-founder and balletmaster of New York City Ballet...
, as well as other violinists such as Fritz Kreisler
Fritz Kreisler
Friedrich "Fritz" Kreisler was an Austrian-born violinist and composer. One of the most famous violin masters of his or any other day, he was known for his sweet tone and expressive phrasing. Like many great violinists of his generation, he produced a characteristic sound which was immediately...
and David Oistrakh
David Oistrakh
David Fyodorovich Oistrakh , , David Fiodorović Ojstrakh, ; – October 24, 1974, was a Soviet violinist....
. Milstein also expressed his generally conservative, strongly anti-communist and anti-Soviet political beliefs. Milstein said that President Kennedy was a weak leader, admired President Reagan, and stated that he refused to return to the Soviet Union, even for a tour sponsored by the United States.
Milstein was married twice, remaining married to his second wife, Therese, until his death. He died of a heart attack in London on December 21, 1992, just three weeks before his 89th birthday.
External links
- http://www.geometry.net/violinists/milstein_nathan.html
- Milstein website (but with dead links)
- Inkpot.com biography