A few historical treasures

July 31, 2010 at 4:10 PM

I was surfing Youtube today and I found a few videos that - to the best of my knowledge - have not been featured on violinist.com before. If they ever have been, it was a while ago.

Here is an interview with Kreisler from 1955, including birthday wishes from many famous violinists. It is a treat to hear their real voices after listening to their violin voices for so long.

Here is, to the best of our knowledge, the first female violinist on record - Dora Valesca Becker in a recording of Wieniawski that dates to 1898.

And here is Sarasate himself playing Zigeurnerweisen. I can see why the ladies went crazy over him. At about 3:35 you can actually hear him speaking.

Moral of the story, if you haven't looked up early violin recordings on Youtube, you must. There is a veritable treasure trove there - Joachim, Ysaye, Powell, Hall... The list goes on and on.

From Anne-Marie Proulx
Posted on August 1, 2010 at 2:24 AM

Thanks!!! What a joy to listen to these links!!!

Anne-Marie

From Marc Villeneuve
Posted on August 1, 2010 at 7:40 PM

Love these rarities. I have seen these before but thanks for the diffusion on violinist.com. Found nice recordings of Jelly d'Aranyi out there playing Brahms Hungarian dances and Toscha Seidel's rare recordings... Kreisler,Seidel and Neveu, my all time favorites...

From Alison Daurio
Posted on August 2, 2010 at 1:00 AM

I loved these! Thanks for sharing them :)

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