Sascha Jacobsen (11 December .S. 29 November1895 - 19 March 1972) was an American

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 teacher born in

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

, now

Finland Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...

. He grew up in

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601, ...

, then moved with his family to

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 ...

as a boy.

Biography

He was born on 11 December 1895 in

Helsinki, Finland Helsinki () is the capital and most populous city in Finland. It is on the shore of the Gulf of Finland and is the seat of southern Finland's Uusimaa region. About people live in the municipality, with million in the capital region and ...

. He graduated from the

Juilliard School The Juilliard School ( ) is a Private university, private performing arts music school, conservatory in New York City. Founded by Frank Damrosch as the Institute of Musical Art in 1905, the school later added dance and drama programs and became ...

in New York in 1915 as a pupil of

Franz Kneisel Franz Kneisel (January 26, 1865, Bucharest – March 26, 1926, New York) was a violinist, conductor, and music teacher. He completed early musical training at the Bucharest Conservatory and moved to Vienna in 1879, where he studied at the Vienna ...

, and on graduation received the Morris Loeb Memorial Award. He founded the Musical Art Quartet, which was active from 1927 to 1933 and made a distinguished early-electric Columbia 78-rpm recording of Haydn's great Quartet in C major, Op. 54, No. 2, which may have been the first complete recording of any Haydn quartet. While in this quartet he played Felix M. Warburg's "Titian" Stradivarius. Later he taught at Juilliard; among his pupils were

Julius Hegyi Julius Hegyi (February 2, 1923 – January 1, 2007) was an American conductor and violinist. He spent his lifetime building orchestras, founding chamber music groups and instilling a passion for music in young and old alike. His belief in con ...

Lynn Blakeslee and Zvi Zeitlin. In the 1950s Jacobsen served as concertmaster in the

Los Angeles Philharmonic The Los Angeles Philharmonic (LA Phil) is an American orchestra based in Los Angeles, California. The orchestra holds a regular concert season from October until June at the Walt Disney Concert Hall and a summer season at the Hollywood Bowl from ...

under

Alfred Wallenstein Alfred Wallenstein (October 7, 1898 – February 8, 1983) was an American cellist and conductor. A successful solo and orchestral cellist in his early life, Wallenstein took up conducting in the 1930s and served as music director of the Los Ang ...

. He played the Red Diamond

Stradivarius A Stradivarius is one of the string instruments, such as violins, violas, cellos, and guitars, crafted by members of the Stradivari family, particularly Antonio Stradivari (Latin: Antonius Stradivarius), in Cremona, Italy, during the late 17th ...

violin (see the story about its loss and restoration a

. He died on 19 March 1972 in

Costa Mesa, California Costa Mesa (; Spanish language, Spanish for "coastal tableland") is a city in Orange County, California, United States. Since its incorporation in 1953, the city has grown from a semi-rural farming community of 16,840 to an urban area including ...

Legacy

Jacobsen is one of the subjects of

George Gershwin George Gershwin (; born Jacob Gershwine; September 26, 1898 – July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist whose compositions spanned jazz, popular music, popular and classical music. Among his best-known works are the songs "Swan ...

's 1922 song "Mischa, Jascha, Toscha, Sascha". Sascha also gave violin lessons to his dear friend Albert Einstein, and recorded on RCA Victor 78s the Chausson Concerto in D major for Violin, Piano and String Quartet with Jascha Heifetz, Jesus Maria Sanroma, and the Musical Art Quartet of which he was the leader.

External links

Sascha Jacobsen recordings
at the

Discography of American Historical Recordings The Discography of American Historical Recordings (DAHR) is a database catalog of master recordings made by American record companies during the 78rpm era. The 78rpm era was the time period in which any flat disc records were being played at ...

References

American male violinists Jewish violinists Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States Russian Jews American people of Russian-Jewish descent 1895 births 1972 deaths 20th-century American violinists 20th-century American male musicians {{US-violinist-stub