His musical career spanned more than seven decades. He made his debut in San Francisco as a child prodigy aged seven and by the age of 13, had performed in London, Paris and Berlin. He went on to develop his talents as a violinist, conductor and teacher, founding the Yehudi Menuhin School, in Surrey, for gifted young musicians in 1963. [...] At the age of 16 the young violinist was conducted by Sir Edward (Elgar) in a now famous recording of the composer's violin concerto, made in 1932.
American violinist and conductor (1916–1999)
Yehudi Menuhin, Baron Menuhin, OM, KBE (April 22, 1916 – March 12, 1999) was an American-born violinist and conductor who spent most of his performing career in the United Kingdom. He became a citizen of Switzerland in 1970, and a British citizen in 1985. He is widely considered one of the greatest violinists of the 20th century.
From: Wikiquote (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Also Known As:
.
Alternative Names:
Yehudi Menuhin, Baron Menuhin
From Wikidata (CC0)
Showing quotes in randomized order to avoid selection bias. Click Popular for most popular quotes.
Enhance Your Quote Experience
Enjoy ad-free browsing, unlimited collections, and advanced search features with Premium.
This wasteful governing by fear, by contempt for the basic dignities of life, this steady asphyxiation of a dependent people, should be the very last means to be adopted by those who themselves know too well the awful significance, the unforgettable suffering of such an existence. It is unworthy of my great people, the Jews, who have striven to abide by a code of moral rectitude for some 5,000 years, who can create and achieve a society for themselves such as we see around us but can yet deny the sharing of its great qualities and benefits to those dwelling amongst them.
We embark unhesitatingly on the path, in a direction that is absolutely right and urgent, supported by everyone, in the knowledge that this path is but a learning process... We have to keep on learning, creating, applying, by-passing, touching upon, refining and clarifying a number of notions and details that need to be improvised and applied and which, thank God, we cannot foresee. The only rigidity lies in our will, our conviction that we are on the right road and that our initiatives are most pressing.
The art of creation lies in the gift of perceiving the particular and generalizing it, thus creating the particular again. It is therefore a powerful transforming force and a generator of creative solutions in relation to a given problem. It is the currency of human exchanges, which enables the sharing of states of the soul and conscience, and the discovery of new fields of experience.
There were other gurus and other lessons, but not until I met Iyengar did I take up the study regularly. My first meeting with him was like the casting of a spell. We made each other's acquaintance in Mumbai. He appeared in my rooms one morning and straightaway made it clear that the "audition" to follow was mine as much as his. For all my celebrity, to him I was just another Western body knotted through and through.
Yehudi Menuhin could play difficult violin pieces by Mozart, Beethoven and Bach at age 7. He played in Carnegie Hall at 11. He was 12 when he made his first record. At 13, he'd played in the finest concert halls in Berlin, London, and Paris. At 19, he embarked on his first world tour – 110 concerts, 63 cities and 13 countries. Yet at 19 he couldn't play a simple A major scale or a basic three-octave arpeggio. And he'd never figured out music theory.
The teacher offers guidance here and there, but the primary factor, the driving force, in your relationship and work together is the student's own commitment and desire to learn. Teaching is like sailing: The wind and the sails give the boat its motion. Your role (as a teacher) is to steer and guide.