Erich Gruenberg
Violin virtuoso renowned for his smooth style who also played on the Beatles’ Sgt Pepper album
ERICH GRUENBERG, who has died aged 95, was an Austrian-born violinist who settled in London immediately after the war, combining a distinguished solo career with chamber music and several posts as orchestra leader; he also appears on the Beatles number A Day in the Life, the final track on Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, a recording he made with a gorilla paw attached to his bowing hand.
Tall and gangly with a high forehead and a gentle demeanour, Gruenberg spoke with a lilting Viennese accent that was matched by the characteristic beauty of his violin playing. “Not only does he extract the last ounce of sentiment, with frequent indulgence in violin scoops adding a particularly apt period flavour,” wrote a Gramophone reviewer approvingly of his Kreisler disc in 1977, “but he also manages to impart a good deal more fire to this music than is often the case with these pieces.”
For several decades Gruenberg was a mainstay of London concert life, giving gloriously smooth accounts of the major violin concertos, not least the Beethoven, of which he made an arguably unsurpassable recording with the New Philharmonia Orchestra under Jascha Horenstein. He also gave the premieres of works by composers such as Malcolm Arnold, Richard Rodney Bennett and John Mccabe, and in 1973 was the soloist in the first Russian performance of Britten’s Violin Concerto with the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra and Gennady Rozhdestvensky.
In the 1980s semi-finalists in the Leeds International Piano Competition were required to accompany Gruenberg in their own choice of violin sonata from a list selected by the competition organisers. However, in 1987 seven of them opted for the Brahms G major Sonata, leaving the poor violinist exhausted but uncomplaining after performing the same work almost non-stop for two days.
Through his work as an orchestral leader Gruenberg was able to observe many of the great conductors. Speaking to Strad magazine in 2012 he told how Colin Davis, a former clarinettist, “had this extraordinary intensity as a player, which then translated into his conducting”; Sergiu Celibidache “could create the most beautiful combinations of sound through the beat alone”; and Daniel Barenboim was “one of the few great instrumentalists whose conducting is every bit as good as his playing”.
Like many classical musicians Gruenberg was often found at Abbey Road working on backing tracks for bands such as the Beatles. One morning in February 1967 he arrived with the other session musicians wearing, as requested, evening dress, whereupon the Fab Four handed out the proceeds of a visit to a joke shop, including stick-on nipples and party hats. Gruenberg received flowery paper spectacles and the infamous gorilla paw.
Erich Gruenberg was born in Vienna on October 12 1924, the son of an Austrian businessman and his wife; his older brother Eli, who in 1953 would start the Allegri String Quartet, later changed his surname to Goren, which helped to avoid confusion between the two violin-paying brothers.
Erich began playing at the age of seven, but by his mid-teens Vienna was a dangerous place for a Jewish boy. During the late 1930s Emil Hauser, founder and director of the Palestine Conservatory, visited Europe furnished with immigration certificates he had obtained from the British authorities. He used them to recruit young Jewish musicians to study in Jerusalem. Saved from the impending Holocaust, Erich and Eli arrived there in 1938.
He made his solo recital debut in 1940 with Peter Wallfisch and in 1946 moved to London to study with Max Rostal. The following year he won the Carl Flesch competition, which led to his British debut playing the Brahms Concerto with the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Eduard van Beinum at the Royal Albert Hall. He took British citizenship in 1950.
Meanwhile, he was throwing himself into chamber music, leading the New London String Quartet for more than 10 years and playing in a trio with the pianist and composer Edmund Rubbra and the cellist William Pleeth. He also gave recitals accompanied by Fanny Waterman and William Glock and led the Boyd Neel Orchestra.
In 1962 Gruenberg was appointed leader of the Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra under Hans Schmidtisserstedt, recalling that on his arrival he was offered a piece of advice: “Play well and talk little.” He deployed the same principle as leader of the London Symphony Orchestra (1962-65) during the Pierre Monteux years and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (1972-76) under Rudolf Kempe and Antal Doráti.
Gruenberg was a demanding yet caring teacher, pushing his students to their limits but never beyond. During the 1980s he taught at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and in 1989 he was appointed professor at the Royal Academy of Music, teaching until just before his 95th birthday. He was also in demand as a competition juror and gave masterclasses worldwide.
In 1990 his precious Stradivarius violin, built in 1731 when its maker was 86, was stolen from him at Los Angeles airport. It turned up nine months later in Honduras, where it was spotted by a musician who informed the police. “What happened to it … I do not know, but it’s like having my baby back,” Gruenberg said, relieved that the instrument had been returned undamaged. “I inspected every part as you would count a baby’s toes.”
Erich Gruenberg was appointed OBE in 1994. In 1956 he married Korshed Madan, who survives him with their two daughters, Joanna and Tina, who are both professional musicians.