Max Saltpeter

Max Salpeter (born April 16, 1908 in London , † January 1, 2010 ) was a British violinist.

The son of Jewish immigrants from Austria-Hungarian Galicia received his first violin lessons only at the age of nine. At fourteen he worked as a silent film musician and at sixteen he directed the orchestra of the Blue Electric Cinema on Edgware Road, London. From 1933 to 1939 he was principal violinist of the London Symphony Orchestra . During World War II he was a member of the Royal Air Force Symphona Orchestra , and in 1945 he played with a small ensemble at the Potsdam Conference for Churchill , Truman and Stalin .

In 1949 Walter Legge brought him to his Philharmonia Orchestra as concertmaster ; he shared the function with Manoug Parikian : Parikian acted as concertmaster when Otto Klemperer conducted, and he himself under Wilhelm Furtwängler . In 1956 he left the Philharmonia Orchestra and turned increasingly to chamber music. He founded the Prometheus Ensemble , which has worked with soloists such as Herbert Downes , Stuart Knussen , Gareth Morris , Leon Goossens , Dennis Brain , Alan Civil , Jack Brymer and Ossian Ellis , and has performed on the radio with pianists Peter Wallfisch , Cyril Preedy and Clifton Halliwell and, after leading the Aeolian Quartet in the late 1940s , played in the string quartets of Harry Blech and Samuel Kutcher .

He then directed the London Mozart Players , the New London Orchestra , the Boyd Neel Orchestra and the Pro-Arte Orchestra , accompanied Frank Sinatra , Louis Armstrong , Dean Martin , Lena Horne , Shirley Bassey and the Beatles and appeared on television shows with Tom Jones , Barbra Streisand and Morecambe and Wise with.

During his long musical career saltpetre came under conductors such as Wilhelm Furtwängler , Arturo Toscanini , Otto Klemperer , Herbert von Karajan , Guido Cantelli and Malcolm Sargent and worked with soloists such as Artur Rubinstein and Sergei Rachmaninoff , Emanuel fire man , David Oistrakh and Jascha Heifetz together . He made recordings of symphonic works and operas with Joan Sutherland , Kiri Te Kanawa , Placido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti and contributed to the soundtracks of various films. In 1986 he ended his career as an active musician after 64 years.

swell

• The Telegraph, February 9, 2010 - Obituaries: Max Salpeter
• The Guardian, March 21, 2010: Max Salpeter obituary