VISIT BY SOVIET VIOLINIST

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28618, 21 June 1958, Page 6

VISIT BY SOVIET VIOLINIST

Oistrakh To Play In Christchurch David Oistrakh, "a musician with no master in the world today,” will visit Christchurch for one concert on June 28. Before his tour of the .United States in 1955, Oistrakh was an unknown Russian violinist. Although he gives about 30 concerts a year in Russia and 30 to 40 abroad, Oistrakh is a professor at the Moscow Conservatory. His musical education began when his father gave him a miniature violin when he was five, and at the age of 12, he played a Beethoven sonata for Prokofiev. He supported his whole family with his income from tours of Russia as soon as he had his diploma, and in 1953 he was made People’s Artist of the U.S.S.R. His wife, who was once a concert pianist, and his son, who created a senation as a violinist in England recently, accompany him on his Australasian tour. Although he has travelled throughout Europe, Oistrakh speaks only Russian and a little German, but his wife speaks English fluently. In his photographs, Oistrakh is a small, plump, unassuming man with short broad hands and stubby powerful fingers. He is dedicated to music and is also fond of chess.

Contemporary Soviet composers form an important part of his repertoire, but his programme in Christchurch consists of betterknown works. Accompanied by Vladimir Yampolski, he will play sonatas by Leclair, Cesar Franck and Prokofiev, and Meditation and Valse Scherzo by Tchaikovsky.