21st Century Violinists - Volume 1

As published in my newsletter, The Media Maven: Midori Goto's photo graces the paperback cover as a distaff representative of the five women profiled. While she is considered one of THE finest female violinists alive, I am extremely impressed with Nadia Solerno-Sonnenberg. Discussing playing "in the zone," she says, it's "not . . . playing a very good performance, even a great performance, but . . . feeling that if someone were to cut off both my arms, I still would play great." An ironic statement considering that once while chopping onions, the knife slipped and she nearly cut off the end of her left little finger, a digit without which her career would have been over. Surgical reattachment and over a year of physical rehab kept her on the circuit. Once, after the breakup of a relationship, she tried to commit suicide but luckily for the listening public, the gun jammed. Russian violinist Maxim Vengerov took "years of the lives of his violin's insurance underwriters by making a [TV] commercial that required him to jump out of an airplane with his priceless Strad." Also included in this book are Isaac Stern, Sarah Chang, Pamela Frank, Corey Cerovsek and Nigel Kennedy. Vol. 2's cover illustration boasts Joshua Bell. A terrific series which I highly recommend.