Julia Fischer Knows How To Juggle Both The Violin & Piano...

[stenka razin]

You will not believe this, but, the fabulous German violinist Julia Fischer is even more amazing than we thought.......Decca is bringing out a DVD with her playing both violin and piano in a 2008 New Year's Day concert. Now that is astonishing. Do any of my fellow CMGers know other great instrumenatalists of the past or present who can play two instruments equally well for public performance?



Details below:
Julia Fischer plays Saint-Saëns & Grieg

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Grieg:
Piano Concerto in A minor, Op. 16

Julia Fischer (piano)

Saint-Saëns:
Violin Concerto No. 3 in B minor, Op. 61

Julia Fischer (violin)


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Junge Deutsche Philharmonie, Matthias Pintscher

German virtuoso Julia Fischer astonished the public and her musical peers by performing two concertos – each on different instruments – on this remarkable 2008 New Year’s Day concert

Julia Fischer’s playing of Saint-Saëns’s Violin Concerto No. 3 not only attests to her position at a summit of perfection attained to by few violinists, but her magisterial performance of the Grieg Piano Concerto establishes her as a pianist of international stature.

Marking her DVD debut for Decca, Julia Fischer’s compelling versions of these concertos are available only in this format, since this musical wonder has recorded neither for CD.

The DVD includes an extensive interview with Julia Fischer, who candidly discusses her life, art, and music (in German, with multi-language subtitles).

[Chalkperson]

That's no big deal, Mel, most Rock Musicians play more than one instrument, Paul McCartney, for example, plays guitar and piano equally well, so does The Edge, Bruce Springsteen and many others...

[Modernistfan]

I can think of several. George Enescu (Enesco in the French form of the name), was an excellent pianist as well as one of the preeminent violinists of his period (he was a teacher of Yehudi Menuhin). Mstislav Rostropovich was a decent pianist as well as a world-class cellist. I suspect that most non-pianists who conduct (Menuhin, Perlman, Vengerov--all predominatnly violinists) are at least reasonably proficient on the piano.

[Ted Quanrud]

That archetype virtuoso, Niccolo Paganini, was also first-rate guitarist. Mozart was famed as a pianist, but played the viola well enough to be part of a string quartet that included Haydn.

Nevertheless, Mel, I agree that Ms. Fischer is doing something remarkable here, and I cannot recall anything like it at least in recent years. I heard her a couple years ago in a jaw-dropping performance of the Tchaikovsky violin concerto. If she is anywhere near that good as a pianist, I will be right in line to buy tickets.

[aurora]

For recital encores, James Ehnes & Alban Gerhardt both did piano 4-hand pieces with their accompanists

[THEHORN]

The late Mstislav Rostropovich was not only one of the greatest cellists of all time but a pretty good pianist,too, and accompanied his wife Galina Vishnevskaya on more than a few of her song recitals.
I wasn't aware that Julia Fischer is also an accomplished pianist.
Paul Hindemith was not only a viola virtuoso but began as a violinist and could play just about every instrument in the orchestra competently ,as well as the piano!

[CharmNewton]

Throwing the piano is the easy part. The hard part is the catching.

John (who thinks a great deal of Ms Fischer's violin playing).

[Ken]

Clips of this performance from the Alte Oper Frankfurt are floating around in the Deutsche Welle website: http://www.dw-world.de/

Last year I downloaded a short documentary about this concert, and it might well still be available online.