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Frank Peter Zimmermann: ‘Music that possesses you’

2026-03-20T09:45:00

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Frank Peter Zimmermann is one of the first German musicians to record Elgar’s emotionally charged Violin Concerto, in a new release with the London Philharmonic Orchestra. He speaks with Thomas Eisner, a first violinist with the LPO, about bringing the work to life

After a couple of scratchy bounces, the gramophone stylus brought Elgar’s Violin Concerto to life. In school assembly there was a twice-weekly tradition of playing a five-minute classical recording. That morning in 1969 was the first time I heard the celebrated 1932 interpretation by the 16-year-old Yehudi Menuhin.

Fifty-six years after that first hearing I am sitting in the middle of the first violin section of the London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) and we’re playing our hearts out in Henry Wood Hall. These are the sessions for Frank Peter Zimmermann’s recording of the Elgar Concerto…

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