Beethoven: Violin Concerto & Romance No.2 / H.Szeryng (Violin) & Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt (2005)

A cosmopolitan fluent in 7 languages, a humanitarian, and a violinist of extraordinary gifts, Szeryng became renowned as a musician's musician by combining a virtuoso technique with a probing discernment of the highest order. –Nicolas Slonimsky

Henryk Szeryng was born in the Warsaw suburb of Zelazowa Wola, the birthplace of Chopin, into a wealthy family, his father being a highly successful industrialist. At the age of three, his musical studies began with piano lessons from his mother. He was seven when he picked up the violin and made it his instrument.
Szeryng's first teacher was Maurice Frenkel, who was an assistant to Leopold Auer in St.Petersburg prior to World War I. Although Frenkel was perhaps the most influential teacher of young Henryk, the wonderfully disciplined training in matters both musical and technical came from the renowned pedagogue Carl Flesch (1873 - 1944), whose expertise virtually created and nurtured Szeryng's immense talent between the years 1930 and 1933.

Flesch was the major musical force that influenced the boy's life through his remarkable teaching approach. It should be mentioned that it was the famous Polish violinist Bronislaw Huberman who, after hearing the 10 year-old Szeryng play the Mendelssohn concerto, convinced his parents that they should approach Flesch.


Later through the elegant and profound Jacques Thibaud and the coaching and guidance of Gabriel Bouillon, Henryk Szeryng became firmly associated with the French school of violin playing. His studies with them led to his graduation from the Paris Conservatoire with the coveted First Prize in 1937. It was back in 1933 that Szeryng made his debut as a concert artist playing the Brahms concerto which, as it turned out, was so highly successful that an extensive concert tour followed immediately in spite of his ongoing studies.

The legendary Nadia Boulanger, his guide in counterpoint and composition, introduced him to such personalities as Heitor Villa-Lobos, Alfred Cortot, Manuel Ponce, Igor Stravinsky and Maurice Ravel.

At the outbreak of World War II Szeryng was appointed liaison officer and interpreter (he spoke and wrote in eight languages) by General Sikorski for the Polish government in Exile. He served in that capacity until 1945, having given well over 300 concerts for allied troops in Europe, Africa and the Americas. In 1942 he joined the exiled Polish Premier in Mexico. The Premier was in search of a home in Latin America for about 4.000 Polish refugees displaced by the war. It was Mexico that finally accepted these desperate and homeless people. Henryk Szeryng was so moved by this humanitarian gesture that he returned to Mexico in 1943. He was offered the post of director of the string department at the National University of Mexico so that he could reorganize the Mexican violin school. In recognition of his musical and cultural merits, he was granted Mexican citizenship in 1948.

Besides this important task, Szeryng regularly gave concerts all over Latin America until the day in 1950 when he met in Mexico his fellow Pole, Arthur Rubinstein, who encouraged him to extend his musical activities over all five continents. The two men enjoyed the deepest friendship which was built upon mutual admiration and respect for each other as human beings and musicians. Rubinstein, who died in 1982, thought of his friend as an artist of the highest order and remarked: "Real music lovers want emotion - great moments - which Szeryng's playing gives them."




Apart from sterling musicianship, Szeryng was a tonalist and a colorist, whose broad musical lines and innate interpretative qualities always reached for the highest peak in the art of violin playing, while his technical command was awesome. This gift was lavished upon an absolutely huge repertoire that delighted his audience around the world. What he asked of himself was exacting, but the result of what he achieved was about as close to perfection as one is likely to encounter.

Szeryng was one of the most recorded violinists in the history of recording with a recording career that spanned more than forty years. It was Szeryng who rediscovered and was the first to record Paganini's third violin concerto. Chávez' "Mexican" concerto, the "Cuban" concerto by Csonka, violin concertos by Manuel Ponce, Benjamin Lees, Camargo Guarnieri, and Jean Martinon, the "Poema Concertante" by Xavier Montsalvatge and compositions by Julian Carrillo, Román Haubenstock-Ramati, Peter Racine Fricker and José Sabre Marroquín are among the works written for him. They were part of his vast program repertoire ranging from the Bach Sonatas and Partitas for violin solo to the great classical concertos. No violinist drew upon a larger number of substantial compositions than Henryk Szeryng!

Apart from the various posts he had held over the years, Szeryng had been appointed Mexican Roving Ambassador for Culture in 1956 and Special Music Advisor to the Mexican Permanent Delegation to UNESCO in 1970 being the first artist ever to travel on a diplomatic passport.

Many honors have been bestowed upon Henryk Szeryng, such as the Grand Prix du Disque six times, the Grammy Award, the Edison, the Golden Record, the Wiener Flötenuhr and the Golden Medal of the Cities of Paris and Jerusalem. In addition, among others he received the Order of Polonia Restituta , the "Commendattore alla Reppublica" of Italy, he was made an Officer of the Crown of Belgium and a Commander of the order of "Alfonso X El Sabio" of Spain. He received the Cross of an Officer of the French Legion of Honor, the Gran Premio Nacional of Mexico and the Commander's Cross of the Order of St.Charles of Monaco. The awards recognize the esteem in which the world held this exceptional man.

The violins that have passed through the hands of Henryk Szeryng are a story in themselves. There was the "Hercules" Stradivarius of 1734 which at one time belonged to Eugene Ysaye. Szeryng put this famous instrument into the hands of Teddy Kollek, Mayor of Jerusalem on December 24, 1972 as a special token of friendship towards the Golden City to be used by the concertmaster of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.

He presented the Prince Sovereign Rainier III of Monaco with his famous Vuillaume, the Messiah Stradivarius copy and he gave to the City of Mexico the "Sanctae Theresiae" instrument by Andrea Guarneri of 1683. Szeryng gave away the majority of his violin collection to cities or to students, such as Shlomo Mintz, who had studied with him in Geneva, retaining only his great Guarnerius del Gesù 1743 "Leduc" and the Pierre Hel 1935, a copy of the Guarnerius del Gesù "Le Roi Joseph".

Henryk Szeryng, a great musician, diplomat, pedagogue and philanthropist, died suddenly in the middle of a tour in Germany after a concert in the city of Kassel. The program of his last performance was the same as for his very first concert 55 years before: the Violin Concerto by Brahms.

Awards and Recognitions

Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music Performance:
- Pierre Fournier, Arthur Rubinstein & Henryk Szeryng for "Schubert: Trios Nos. 1 in B Flat, Op. 99 and 2 in E Flat, Op. 100 (Piano Trios)" (1976)
- Pierre Fournier, Arthur Rubinstein & Henryk Szeryng for "Brahms: Trios (Complete)/Schumann: Trio No. 1 in D Minor" (1975)

- Grand Prix du Disque 1959 for the Brahms violin concerto with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Pierre Monteux
- Grand Prix du Disque for the Bach Solo Sonatas and Partitas (DGG)


Tracklisting:

01. Violin Concerto in D op.61 - 1. Allegro ma non troppo <25:32>
02. Violin Concerto in D op.61 - 2. Larghetto <10:18>
03. Violin Concerto in D op.61 - 3. Rondo (allegro) <9:53>
04. Romance No.2 in F op.50 <9:47>



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