Hopkinson Smith (born December 7, 1946) is a Swiss- American

lute A lute ( or ) is any plucked string instrument with a neck (music), neck and a deep round back enclosing a hollow cavity, usually with a sound hole or opening in the body. It may be either fretted or unfretted. More specifically, the term "lu ...

nist and pedagogue, longtime resident in

Basel Basel ( ; ), also known as Basle ( ), ; ; ; . is a city in northwestern Switzerland on the river Rhine (at the transition from the High Rhine, High to the Upper Rhine). Basel is Switzerland's List of cities in Switzerland, third-most-populo ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

. Smith was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

, the son of architectural writer and photographer G. E. Kidder Smith. He graduated from

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

with Honors in Music (Thesis on ''"The Pavans of Daniel Bacheler"''). He moved to Europe in 1973 to study

and

vihuela The vihuela () is a 15th-century fretted plucked Spanish string instrument, shaped like a guitar (figure-of-eight form offering strength and portability) but tuned like a lute. It was used in 15th- and 16th-century Spain as the equivalent of t ...

with the renowned Catalan classical guitarist Emilio Pujol, as well as Eugen Mueller-Dombois. In the mid-1970s, Hopkinson Smith was involved in the founding of the ensemble Hespèrion XX, which led to his ten-year collaboration with

Jordi Savall Jordi Savall i Bernadet (; born 1 August 1941) is a Spanish Conducting, conductor, composer and viol player. He has been one of the major figures in the field of Western early music since the 1970s, largely responsible for popularizing the viol ...

. Since the mid-1980s, Hopkinson Smith has focused principally on solo music for early plucked instruments. These include the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

lute,

theorbo The theorbo is a plucked string instrument of the lute family, with an extended neck that houses the second pegbox. Like a lute, a theorbo has a curved-back sound box with a flat top, typically with one or three sound holes decorated with rose ...

and

Baroque The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western Style (visual arts), style of Baroque architecture, architecture, Baroque music, music, Baroque dance, dance, Baroque painting, painting, Baroque sculpture, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from ...

guitars and the baroque lute. His 2000 recording of the J.S. Bach sonatas and partitas for solo violin adapted for baroque lute has been called 'arguably the best you can buy of these works – on any instrument' by ''Gramophone'' magazine. He additionally recorded the J.S. Bach cello suites adapted for

. Hopkinson Smith gives concerts and masterclasses throughout Europe, Asia, Australia and North and South America. He lives in

, where he taught at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis until his retirement in 2020.

Teacher

Hopkinson Smith’s former students include

Rolf Lislevand Rolf Lislevand (30 December 1961), is a Norwegian performer of Early music specialising on lute, vihuela, baroque guitar and theorbo. Biography Lislevand was born in Oslo. From 1980 to 1984, he studied classical guitar at the Norwegian Academy ...

, Xavier Diaz-Latorre, Evangelina Mascardi, Miguel Yisrael,

Edin Karamazov Edin Karamazov (born Edin Džananović in 1965) is a Bosnian musician, lutenist and guitarist. Biography Karamazov studied lute with Hopkinson Smith at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis. He has worked with such ensembles as Hesperion XX, L'A ...

, Luciano Contini, Andreas Martin, Yasunori Imamura, Rafael Bonavita, and Peter Croton.

References

External links

Official website
by Bruce Duffie, April 16, 2003
Hopkinson Smith artist page
on

Naïve Records Naïve Records is a French independent record label based in Paris, specializing in electronic music, pop music, jazz and classical music. Founding and expansion It was founded in 1998 by Patrick Zelnik, former CEO of Virgin France, Gilles Paire ...

Hopkinson Smith discography
on

Discogs Discogs ( ; short for " discographies") is a database of information about audio recordings, including commercial releases, promotional releases, and bootleg or off-label releases. Database contents are user-generated, and described in ''T ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Hopkinson 1946 births Living people American performers of early music Harvard University alumni American lutenists Academic staff of Schola Cantorum Basiliensis Classical musicians from New York (state)