David Wilson Interviews Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra violinist Wilfried Hedenborg

[astrotoy]

Myles, that is a great story. We were able to hear the VPO on its northern California tour in March, 2014. They stopped in Berkeley for a week, giving workshops and classes and 3 concerts, and then went up to Sonoma to give one concert (when the interview was done). We got tickets for all three of the Berkeley concerts. As some may know, the VPO is self governing and doesn't have a permanent conductor. So we heard Lorin Maazel, only a few months before he died, and then two concerts conducted by the young Andris Nelsons, the new music director of the BSO. The VPO does have a magical quality to their string playing. They have some interesting traditions. They place extra violins hanging from the back of chairs in the violin sections, so that if someone's instrument has a string break, they can quickly get another instrument to play. Also the outside stand partners turn pages for the inside partner (normally the inside player who ranks lower does the page turning.) Seeing them in Berkeley was not cheap, but tickets were less expensive and easier to get than in Vienna!

Ruggerio Ricci, the famous violin, who was the interviewee's teacher, and whose bow was copied, was actually born in the US, near San Francisco, with the given name of Woodrow Wilson Rich (his brother was George Washington Rich). He was a prodigy and had the same teacher as Yehudi Menuhin, who was just a few years older (also from San Francisco). His parents changed his name to Ruggerio Ricci to make it more European sounding.

Larry

[MylesBAstor]

Fascinating segment about the sound of a violin!