Rudolf Baumgartner (14 September 1917 – 22 March 2002) was a

Swiss Swiss most commonly refers to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland * Swiss people Swiss may also refer to: Places * Swiss, Missouri * Swiss, North Carolina * Swiss, West Virginia * Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses * Swiss Café, an old café located ...

conductor Conductor or conduction may refer to: Biology and medicine * Bone conduction, the conduction of sound to the inner ear * Conduction aphasia, a language disorder Mathematics * Conductor (ring theory) * Conductor of an abelian variety * Cond ...

violin The violin, sometimes referred to as a fiddle, is a wooden chordophone, and is the smallest, and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in regular use in the violin family. Smaller violin-type instruments exist, including the violino picc ...

ist and music educator. In 1956 he founded the

Lucerne Festival Strings The Lucerne Festival Strings is one of Switzerland's most frequently touring chamber orchestras, which for decades was closely associated with the Lucerne School of Music, being for many years an "ensemble in residence". History The orchestra ...

chamber orchestra Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music ...

together with Wolfgang Schneiderhan.

Life and career

Born in

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

, Switzerland, Baumgartner earned degrees in music from the

University of Zurich The University of Zurich (UZH, ) is a public university, public research university in Zurich, Switzerland. It is the largest university in Switzerland, with its 28,000 enrolled students. It was founded in 1833 from the existing colleges of the ...

and the Zurich Conservatory. At the latter institution he was a pupil of

Stefi Geyer Stefi Geyer (June 28, 1888 in Budapest – December 11, 1956 in Zürich) was a Hungarian violinist who was considered one of the leading violinists of her generation. Biography Born in 1888 in Budapest, she was the daughter of Josef Geyer, a p ...

and . After completing these studies, he pursued further training in the violin privately with

Carl Flesch Carl Flesch (born Károly Flesch, 9 October 1873 – 14 November 1944) was a Hungarian classical violinist and teacher. Flesch’s compendium ''Scale System'' is a staple of violin pedagogy. Life and career Flesch was born in Moson (now part of ...

in Paris and Wolfgang Schneiderhan in Vienna. He later co-founded the Lucerne Festival Strings with Schneiderhan in 1956. In the 1950s Baumgartner recorded the complete sonatas for violin and harpsichord of J.S. Bach with the Austrian harpsichordist

Isolde Ahlgrimm Isolde Ahlgrimm (31 July 1914 in Vienna – 11 October 1995 in Vienna) was an Austrian harpsichordist and fortepiano, fortepianist. In 1975 she was awarded the Austrian Gold Medal. Musical education Ahlgrimm pursued her early piano studies f ...

for Phillips, although the masters have been lost. In 1954 he joined the faculty of the Lucerne Conservatory as a professor of violin, and later became the director of that institution in 1960. From 1969 through 1980 he was also artistic director of the

Lucerne Festival Lucerne Festival is one of the leading international festivals in the world of classical music and presents a series of classical music festivals based in Lucerne, Switzerland. Founded in 1938 by Ernest Ansermet and Walter Schulthess, it curr ...

. Baumgartner died in

Siena Siena ( , ; traditionally spelled Sienna in English; ) is a city in Tuscany, in central Italy, and the capital of the province of Siena. It is the twelfth most populated city in the region by number of inhabitants, with a population of 52,991 ...

, Italy on 22 March 2002.

References

1917 births 2002 deaths Musicians from Zurich Swiss male conductors (music) Swiss classical violinists Male classical violinists Swiss performers of early music 20th-century classical violinists 20th-century Swiss conductors (music) 20th-century Swiss male musicians {{Switzerland-musician-stub