Yehudi Menuhin 110th anniversary: music with friends

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To mark the 110th anniversary of Yehudi Menuhin’s birth on 22 April 1916, Tully Potter presents an overview of the great violinist’s numerous chamber music partnerships and their recordings

What can be said about Yehudi Menuhin that is new, for his 110th birthday? Well, we can try to counter the cut-and-dried opinions about his playing that seem to have become set in stone over the past 50 years or so. Here is the most prevalent capsule judgment: Menuhin was a wonderful violinist in the 1930s but lost his natural flair in the 1940s and was beset by technical difficulties which marred his playing in the 1950s and thereafter. There is just enough truth in that statement to be dangerous, but I would like to propose a different opinion…

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