Brilliant Young Violinist's U.S. Debut

Radio Record, Volume XII, Issue 28, 23 December 1938, Page 5

Brilliant Young Violinist's U.S. Debut

RODIGIES of the violin are nothing new in the musical world, Menuhin may be said to have started the most recent wave, and at the present time there are probably anything up to half a dozen youngsters who ave being hailed as geniuses.

Most recent prodigy to startle evities with his mature virtuosity ig iT-year-old Robert Virovai, a Yugoslav of Hungarian parentage, who recently made a. sensational debut in the U.S. Robert Virovai was born in 1921 in the Yugoslav mountain resort of Daruvar, but when he was six he was taken to a local teacher of the violin at Belgrade, and four years later his family moyed to Budapest. At 13 he emerged from the Budapest Conservatoire, already showing: promise of rare brilliance,

{Continued from foot Column 2.) and his playing deeply impressed the late Jeno de Syalatna Hubay, one of Hurope’s most famous teachers, whe took him as a pupil. Virovai soon became famous in Budapest, and before he died last year, Hubay remarked of him, "He plays so beautifully as to astonish even me." And Hubey, through whose hands haye passed some of the world’s finest violinists, including Joseph Szigeti, knew fine playing when he heard it. Few of the Philharmonic Symphony cencertgoers who attend Virovai’s US. debut had heard of him, but before his recital was half-way through, the staid audience was stamping and shonutjug with delight, Critics present immediately placed him in the front rani of present-day violinists, and deseribed his appearance as one of the most exciting debuts they had attended. Virovai’s playing’ is remarkable not only for its brilliant technique and beautifu} tone, but for masterly restraint and timing.