Born: 27 October
1782, Genua, Italy Died: 27 May 1840, Nice, France
Paganini,
Nicoló
One of the greatest violin
players of all times, and the predominant
virtuoso
of this instrument. His father taught
him to play, and when he was as young as 9 years old, he began appearing
in concerts. As a violinist, he was outstandingly successful, and made
a fortune. He was the first player who made performance tours around Europe,
and his success was unprecedented. His performance was so astonishing,
his appearance so bizarre and his playing so fascinating - superstitions
and gossip claimed him to have made a pact with the devil. People did not
know such perfect playing of any instrument back then, and insisted on
touching him before they believed he was human. In one Italian town, a
rich merchant lent him his expensive "Guarneri"
violin, but when the concert was over he refused to accept it back and
gave it to Paganini as a present. In another place he was given a "Stradivarius"
violin, having interpreted "prima vista"
a particularly hard work.
As
a performer, Paganini barely played the conventional violin repertory and
concentrated on his own pieces, in which he introduced the amazing playing
techniques he developed. Although he rarely played works by other
musicians, he ordered a Viola
piece from Berlioz
(and the result was "Harold in Italy",
which he had never performed) and paid him a fortune, surprisingly, since
he was known to be a miser (some say he did a favor for Berlioz's friend,
who did not want to embarrass him with such a large donation).
Many 19th century composers were dazzled by his talent,
and were so deeply affected by him that they incorporated difficult technical
elements in their work. Liszt,
who was a virtuoso pianist
himself, admired him and tried to build himself a reputation as
"the piano's Paganini". Like Liszt, Schumann
arranged Paganini's 24 Violin Capriccios
for piano. Chopin
wrote etudes
in which Paganini's influence is evident, and Brahms
composed variations on one of the themes in one of those capriccios.
Paganini did not publish much of his work, and for this reason, only a
few are nowadays heard in concerts, and among those few the Violin
Concerti Nos. 1 and 2 and the Sonatas for
Guitar, an instrument he played and for which he wrote several other
pieces.
Paganini-Variations "God save the King" (by Frank Peter Zimmermann)
