To-day the concert agent searches among the new lights for one or two who seem, in his judgment, likely to please the audiences to whom he caters, and who will justify the curiosity roused by the wholesale advertising done in their behalf.
The violinist is rushed from one place to another with mechanical precision, and flits from Maine to California and from Canada to the Gulf in a few short weeks. There are more soloists, more concerts, more musical organisations than ever before.
It does not follow by any means that the travelling virtuoso is one of the greatest violinists of his time. There are, in every city of Europe and in many cities of America, violinists who equal or even excel many of those who are exploited as virtuosi. The great violinists are not to be found every day. In the past twenty years, perhaps, not more than two can be recalled who have visited the United States as mature, great artists,—Wilhelmj and Ysaye. Many violinists of excellent ability have been heard, and to some of them some day the adjective great may be applied. The fact that they have devoted their energies to concert work, and have been favourably received by the most important musical organisations, makes them celebrated, but the word great can apply but to few.
Adolf Brodsky, who came to America in 1892, and who is a violinist of much ability, with a beautiful tone, facile and brilliant technique, but somewhat lacking in elegance and polish, did not come to tour the country as a virtuoso. He was engaged by Mr. Walter Damrosch as concert-master for the New York orchestra, but during his stay in this country he appeared in many of the most important concerts, and was considered one of the best violinists who had ever come to live in America.
Brodsky was born in 1851 at Taganrog, in Southern Russia, and was one of those who found his profession at the age of four, when he bought a violin at a fair, and began to pick out Russian folk-tunes.
For four years he was taught music at home, and made good progress. Then a wealthy gentleman was attracted by his talent, hearing him play at a concert at Odessa, and provided the funds necessary for him to go to Vienna and study under Hellmesberger. He became second violin in the celebrated Hellmesberger Quartet, and thus gained a great reputation as a quartet player.
After travelling all over Europe for four years, he was appointed second professor of the violin at the Conservatory of Moscow, where he remained another four years. Then followed more study and more travel until, when Schradieck accepted the position of violin teacher at the Cincinnati conservatory, Brodsky was appointed to fill his place at Leipzig. In 1892 he was called to New York, but, owing to troubles which arose in the musical profession, he returned to Europe the following year, and, after a short sojourn in Berlin, received the appointment of director of the Royal College of Music at Manchester, England, where he succeeded Sir Charles Hallé.
Emil Sauret is well known in America, for he visited the United States in 1872-73, and made a tour which was so successful, that it was repeated in 1874, when he travelled with Ilma di Murska, the great singer, and his wife, Teresa Careño, the pianist.
EMIL SAURET