ZIMBALIST

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 42, 12 May 1927, Page 3

ZIMBALIST

LEAVES SAN FRANCISCO Amid the greatest enthusiasm that San Francisco is capable of the famous violinist, Efrem Zimbalist after a farewell recital, sailed for Australia and New Zealand, via Honolulu, where he is to give a series of recitals for Concert Tours Ltd., prior to his arrival in New Zealand and Australia under engagement to this firm. There is no knowing to what heights the Australian public will rise over the advent of this great virtuoso. Always lovers of the violin, this season will offer a chance to this public such as they never have had before of comparing two of the three greatest living masters—Heifetz and Zimbalist, two fast friends. In the early days when Zimbalist, by reason of the fact that the gods were better to him in lavishing worldly goods upon him than to Heifetz, who as the child of poorer parents was having a struggle to gain the ear of a great master, and being younger than Zimbalist, it was necessary, as is always the case, to have just that little boost which gets us a place in the sun—Efrem Zimbalist was able, as the star pupil of Leopold Auer, to get an audience with the great maestro for his young pal Jascha Heifetz. Great talent always comes into its own, and the mere fact of their early association has welded a lifelong friendship between these two distinguished players. To have the opportunity of comparison in the same year, when the ear retains the impression of both artists, is rare in this part of the world, and the joy of waiting for the arrival of Efrem Zimbalist as a “bonne buche” to a musically glorious winter is a treat of which all real devotees of music will avail themselves when he makes his debut here in Auckland under the comprehensive baton of the directors of Concert Tours Ltd.