Joseph Szigeti

Joseph Szigeti (of his true name József Szigeti ) was famous a American Violoniste of Hungarian origin , born the September 5th 1892 with Budapest and deceased the February 19th 1973 with Lucerne (Suisse). It was in particular a heat defender of the music of his time.

Biography

Childhood in Hungary

Having lost his mother very early, the József young person is sent by his father food near his grandparents in the area of the Carpathes, with Máramaros-Sziget (from where the family draws her name). Its family is already musician: his/her father is violonist (it holds a coffee orchestra in Budapest), one of his/her uncles also plays of the violin and another of his/her uncles is Contrebassiste. Its first lessons of Violon will thus come to him from his/her father and his uncle.

At 11 years, it joined his father with Budapest and integrates the class of violin of Jeno Hubay into famous the Académie Franz-Liszt. Child prodigy, it there remains only two years (1903-1905) and gives to thirteen years its first public concert.

European beginnings

In the years which follow, the Szigeti young person occurs like child prodigy through the Europe, in Germany in particular where Joseph Joachim notices it and offers to him to become its pupil. But Szigeti refuses and settles in England where it produces successfully in 1907 in the Concerto into semi major of Bach and the concerto of Tchaïkovski with New Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Thomas Beecham. It there also interprets the Concerto of Busoni under the direction of the Compositeur and creates in 1909 the concerto of Hamilton Harty, composed with its intention.

In 1913, Szigeti, patient of the Tuberculosis, share to look after in a Swiss Sanatorium . It remains there during all the First World War. From 1917 to 1924, he teaches moreover the violin with the Academy of Geneva.

The international soloist

As from 1922, taking again its career of soloist, it occurs with the Philharmonic orchestra of Berlin under the direction of Fritz Reiner, but also in England and Soviet Union (11 rounds of 1924 to 1929), country where it is the first to play the Concerto nº 1 of Prokofiev.

It makes its American beginnings with Carnegie Hall with the Concerto of Beethoven on December 15th, 1925 with Leopold Stokowski and the Orchestre of Philadelphia. It is a triumph and Szigeti, although installed with Paris in the inter-war period does not fail to return regularly to the the United States.

It is this country besides where, fleeing the war in Europe, it chooses to emigrate with his wife in 1940; it obtains eleven years from them later the citizenship. It finds on the American its compatriot and friendly ground Béla Bartók (they knew each other since the middle of the Twenties) with which it occurs in concerts, in particular at the time of a memorable recital on April 13rd, 1940 with the Bibliothèque of the Congress. Bartók did not fail besides to write some parts to him, in particular the Contrasts for Piano, Violon and Clarinette which it creates with the other dedicatee, the Clarinettiste of Jazz Benny Goodman.

Last years

After the war, Szigeti takes again its career of concert performer, playing in particular with the large pianist Artur Schnabel. However, its technique is reduced and in 1960, stopping the concerts definitively, it is withdrawn in Suisse where it continues to give master-classes until its death, in 1973. It also benefits from its last years to write some publications on its life and its instrument. Its preferred violins was the Guarneri custom; it had two besides of them.

Musical repertory & partners

Szigeti had many friends among the type-setters of his time. He will have been the creator and the dedicatee of many works among which the First Rhaposy and the Contrasts of Bartók, the Sonate of Rawsthorne, exotic Nuit of Bloch, the Mélodie without word nº 5 of Prokofiev, the Sonate in ground of Ysaÿe and concertos of Casella, Harty and Martin. He much also played Stravinski, Hindemith, Milhaud, Ravel, Ives, Berg without neglecting the “old hand however”: one him must have in particular made redécouvrir parts of Tartini and of Berlioz, the concertos of Brahms and Beethoven formed part as for them of its repertory of predilection.

The pianist Nikita Magaloff was one of his frequent partners of chamber music. This one became in 1939 his/her son-in-law when he married his daughter, Irene Szigeti. Other partners of Szigeti were Claudio Arrau, Joseph Levine, William Primrose, Dimitri Mitropoulos, Eugene Ormandy…

Joseph Szigeti will have also recorded more than one hundred of discs (at Columbia mainly).

Publications

With Strings Attached (New York, 1947)
has Violinist' S Notebook (London, 1965)
Szigeti one the Violin: Improvisations There is Violinist' S Themes (New York, 1969).

Sources

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