Two great violinists were born on this date – Fritz Kreisler in 1875 and Jascha Heifetz in 1901. Both took the art of violin playing to new heights – Kreisler with his warmth and expressiveness of tone, Heifetz with his dazzling technique and almost superhuman virtuosity, as demonstrated in this recording (taken from a radio broadcast) of Kreisler's Recitative and Scherzo...
The first time Kreisler saw Heifetz playing was at a private matinee in 1912. Then 11 years old, Heifetz was already a seasoned performer (he once told one of the Marx Brothers that he'd been earning his living as a musician since he was seven, eliciting the reply 'Before that, I suppose, you were just a bum'). On hearing the young Heifetz play, Kreisler said to all present, 'We may as well break our fiddles across our knees.' Here is, ahem, 'historic footage' of that encounter...
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