Abraham Alexander Schneider (October 21, 1908 – February 2, 1993) was a violinist, conductor and educator. Born to a
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
family in
Vilnius
Vilnius ( , ; see also other names) is the capital and largest city of Lithuania, with a population of 592,389 (according to the state register) or 625,107 (according to the municipality of Vilnius). The population of Vilnius's functional u ...
, Lithuania, he later moved to the United States as a member of the
Budapest String Quartet.
Early life
Alexander (Sasha) was born Abram Sznejder. At 13, he almost died of
tetanus
Tetanus, also known as lockjaw, is a bacterial infection caused by '' Clostridium tetani'', and is characterized by muscle spasms. In the most common type, the spasms begin in the jaw and then progress to the rest of the body. Each spasm usuall ...
after cutting his knee in an accident. The tetanus distorted his joints and recovery was long and painful. Sasha left Vilnius in 1924 and joined his brother Mischa Schneider in
Frankfurt
Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , " Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its ...
after securing a scholarship to study violin with
Adolf Rebner, the principal violin tutor at the
Hoch Conservatory
Dr. Hoch's Konservatorium – Musikakademie was founded in Frankfurt am Main on 22 September 1878. Through the generosity of Frankfurter Joseph Hoch, who bequeathed the Conservatory one million German gold marks in his testament, a school for ...
.
Career
In 1927, Alexander became leader (concertmaster) of an orchestra in Saarbrücken. It was at this point that he changed his name. The conductor wanted him as leader, but wanted a German-sounding name. Abram took Schneider as a surname because his brother Mischa had already chosen it, and Alexander appealed to him as a first name. In 1929, he was appointed leader of the
Norddeutscher Rundfunk
Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR; ''Northern German Broadcasting'') is a public broadcasting, public radio and television broadcaster, based in Hamburg. In addition to the city-state of Hamburg, NDR broadcasts for the German states of Lower Saxony, M ...
Orchestra in
Hamburg
Hamburg (, ; nds, label=Hamburg German, Low Saxon, Hamborg ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg (german: Freie und Hansestadt Hamburg; nds, label=Low Saxon, Friee un Hansestadt Hamborg),. is the List of cities in Germany by popul ...
. In 1932, he lost this job as a result of the ongoing Nazi campaign against Jews, and soon had to leave Germany.
[
]
Budapest String Quartet
At this time, the Budapest String Quartet, whose cellist was Sasha's brother Mischa, lost their first violinist. Although the quartet had not yet left Germany, they spent a lot of time out of the country, were self-employed, and the Nazis had not yet caught up with them. For Sasha to join them was an ideal arrangement all round. Their existing second violinist, Josef Roismann, switched to first and Sasha joined as second. This was because Roismann was already comfortable with the other players whereas Sasha would need time to learn their repertoire and style.[Brandt, Nat (1993). ''Con Brio: Four Russians Called the Budapest String Quartet''. ]Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print book ...
.
In 1934, the Nazis made threats to the quartet and they left Berlin for Paris the next day, never to return to Germany again – even on tour. When war broke out in 1939, they happened to be on tour in the United States. They all obtained permission to stay and from then on made it their base.[
]
Independence
Later on, Schneider felt the need to develop himself as an independent musician, so he left the quartet in 1944, full of energy and ideas. He was offered a conductorship of the Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera (commonly known as the Met) is an American opera company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, currently situated on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. The company is operat ...
, and leadership of the Pro Arte and Paganini Quartets but turned them down. He toured with Ralph Kirkpatrick and he formed the Albeneri Trio with Benar Heifetz and Erich Itor Kahn.[
In 1949, Schneider formed the ]Schneider Quartet
Schneider may refer to:
Hospital
* Schneider Children's Medical Center of Israel
People
*Schneider (surname)
Companies and organizations
* G. Schneider & Sohn, a Bavarian brewery company
* Schneider Rundfunkwerke AG, the former owner of the D ...
to perform and record all eighty-three Haydn quartets. This was not completed because its sponsor, the Haydn Society, ran out of funds.[ The same year he recorded Bach's complete Sonatas and Partitas for Unaccompanied Violin (]BWV
The (BWV; ; ) is a catalogue of compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach. It was first published in 1950, edited by Wolfgang Schmieder. The catalogue's second edition appeared in 1990. An abbreviated version of that second edition, known as BWV ...
1001-1006) for Mercury Records
Mercury Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group. It had significant success as an independent operation in the 1940s and 1950s. Smash Records and Fontana Records were sub labels of Mercury. In the United States, it is ...
.
In Prades, Schneider studied with Pablo Casals
Pau Casals i Defilló (Catalan: ; 29 December 187622 October 1973), usually known in English by his Castilian Spanish name Pablo Casals, and persuaded him to participate in the 1950 Prades Festival to honor the 200th anniversary of Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach (28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his orchestral music such as the ''Brandenburg Concertos''; instrumental compositions such as the Cello Suites; keyboard wo ...
's death.[ He supported Casals in further Bach festivals at Prades and ]Perpignan
Perpignan (, , ; ca, Perpinyà ; es, Perpiñán ; it, Perpignano ) is the prefecture of the Pyrénées-Orientales department in southern France, in the heart of the plain of Roussillon, at the foot of the Pyrenees a few kilometres from the ...
.[ Later he would conduct Casals' oratorio ''The Manger'' (''El Pessebre'') in Guadalajara, ]Jalisco
Jalisco (, , ; Nahuatl: Xalixco), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Jalisco ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Jalisco ; Nahuatl: Tlahtohcayotl Xalixco), is one of the 31 states which, along with Mexico City, comprise the 32 Federal ...
, Mexico
Mexico ( Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guate ...
, during the ''Festival Casals de México'', recording it in 1973 in Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico ( es, link=yes, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, lit=Free Associated State of Puerto Rico), is a Caribbean island and Unincorporated ...
.
Schneider was a very sociable man with a wide circle of friends. He worked hard to promote chamber music with free or subsidized concerts.[
]
Return to the Budapest String Quartet
In 1956, the Budapest String Quartet persuaded Schneider to rejoin them. They had tried two other second violinists (Ortenberg and Gorodetzky), neither of them able to reach Schneider's high standards, and Roismann had refused to continue with anyone else. Schneider had remained in close contact with the quartet and he stood in for Ortenberg or Gorodetzky when they were ill. Now it was agreed the quartet would operate part-time with Schneider and he would continue his independent career. They finally disbanded in 1967.[
]
New School, Brandenburg and Washington Square
Schneider was the artistic director of the Schneider Concerts at the New School
The New School is a private research university in New York City. It was founded in 1919 as The New School for Social Research with an original mission dedicated to academic freedom and intellectual inquiry and a home for progressive thinkers. ...
in New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...
, from 1957 until his death. Under the auspices of the New School, Schneider and his manager, Frank Salomon, founded the New York String Orchestra, a year-end seminar-performance for young string musicians, in 1969.
During the time Schneider also joined forces as the conductor of the Columbia Symphony Orchestra
The Columbia Symphony Orchestra was an orchestra formed by Columbia Records strictly for the purpose of making recordings. In the 1950s, it provided a vehicle for some of Columbia's better known conductors and recording artists to record using o ...
with the legendary Rudolf Serkin
Rudolf Serkin (28 March 1903 – 8 May 1991) was a Bohemian-born Austrian-American pianist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest Beethoven interpreters of the 20th century.
Early life, childhood debut, and education
Serkin was born in ...
to record Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition r ...
's Piano Concerto No. 21 in C Major, K. 467 and Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 27 in B flat major, K. 595 for Columbia Masterworks (ML 5013, 1957).
Schneider played with a number of other chamber groups, among them his own string group, and the Brandenburg Ensemble
Brandenburg (; nds, Brannenborg; dsb, Bramborska ) is a state in the northeast of Germany bordering the states of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Saxony, as well as the country of Poland. With an area of 29,480 ...
. In 1975, he accompanied pianist Arthur Rubinstein
Arthur Rubinstein ( pl, Artur Rubinstein; 28 January 188720 December 1982) was a Polish-American pianist. in Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classic ...
's '' Emperor Concerto'' with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra in Israel in 1975.
Scneider founded the Washington Square Music Festival in 1953, a free alfresco concert series specializing in chamber music for the enjoyment and education of his Greenwich Village neighbors. Now an international festival, it continues with his mission.
Recognition
Schneider received the Kennedy Center Honors
The Kennedy Center Honors are annual honors given to those in the performing arts for their lifetime of contributions to American culture. They have been presented annually since 1978, culminating each December in a gala celebrating five hono ...
in 1988.
Death
Schneider died of heart failure in Manhattan, New York City, at the age of 84.[Kozinn, Allan (February 4, 1993)]
"Alexander Schneider, Violon Virtuoso, Dies at 84"
''The New York Times''.
References
External links
* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20071225223232/http://www.kennedy-center.org/calendar/index.cfm?fuseaction=showIndividual&entitY_id=3796&source_type=A Kennedy Center biography
"Farewell to the Budapest"
''Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, t ...
''. January 10, 1969. (archived fro
the original
December 14, 2008)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Schneider, Alexander
Lithuanian classical violinists
American classical violinists
Male classical violinists
American male violinists
Jewish classical violinists
Jewish American classical musicians
Concertmasters
Kennedy Center honorees
American people of Lithuanian-Jewish descent
Emigrants from the Russian Empire to Germany
Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United States
Hoch Conservatory alumni
Lithuanian Jews
1908 births
1993 deaths
20th-century classical violinists
20th-century American male musicians
20th-century American Jews
20th-century American violinists