This Week in Classical Music: July 1, 2024. Sarker and more.We will celebrate János Starker’s 100th birthday on July 5th. One of the greatest cellists of the 20th century, Starker was born in Budapest in 1924 into a Jewish family.Starker, a child prodigy, entered the Budapest Academy at the age of seven and gave his first solo performance at 11.His teachers at the Academy were Leo Weiner, Zoltán Kodály, Béla Bartók and Ernő (Ernst von) Dohnányi – the pre-war Budapest Academy was a great music institution. Starker left the Academy in 1939, the year WWII started; he spent the wartime in Budapest and survived (the majority of the Budapest Jews were sent to Auschwitz in the last months of the war and perished there; two of his older brothers were murdered by the Nazis). After the war, with Budapest occupied by the Soviets, Starker joined the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra as Principal Cello.In 1946 he left Hungary, going to Paris first and two years later to the US.He became the principal cellist of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra whose music director was a fellow Hungarian Jewish conductor Antal Doráti.From 1949 to 1953 Starker was the principal cello of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, then under the direction of Fritz Reiner, another Jewish musician from Budapest.From 1953 to 1958 he occupied the same position at the Chicago Symphony, which at that time was also led by Reiner.In 1958 Starker was appointed professor of cello at Indiana University, Bloomington; he remained there for the rest of his life.He toured widely and made many recordings.
Starker recorded the complete set of Bach’s cello suites five times, the first recording made in 1950-52, the last – in 1997; that one won a Grammy.Here’s Johann Sebastian Bach’s Suite no. 5 in c minor.János Starker recorded it in New York on April 15th and 15th of 1963.There are many wonderful performances of this piece, we think this is one of the very best.
Starker died in Bloomington, Indiana, on April 28th of 2013.
We’d also like to mention several other names.Hans Werner Henze, an influential and prolific German composer, was born in Dresden on July 1st of 1926.And more than two centuries earlier, on July 2nd of 1714, another German, the great Christoph Willibald Gluck was born in the village of Erasbach, now part of Berching, a town in Bavaria.
We wanted to write about Hanns Eisler but Starker’s 100th anniversary intervened.Eisler, a composer of considerable talent, strong political opinions and an unusual life, was born on July 6th of 1898.We’ll write about him next week.
Janos Starker 100
This Week in Classical Music: July 1, 2024. Sarker and more. We will celebrate János Starker’s 100th birthday on July 5th. One of the greatest cellists of the 20th century, Starker was
born in Budapest in 1924 into a Jewish family. Starker, a child prodigy, entered the Budapest Academy at the age of seven and gave his first solo performance at 11. His teachers at the Academy were Leo Weiner, Zoltán Kodály, Béla Bartók and Ernő (Ernst von) Dohnányi – the pre-war Budapest Academy was a great music institution. Starker left the Academy in 1939, the year WWII started; he spent the wartime in Budapest and survived (the majority of the Budapest Jews were sent to Auschwitz in the last months of the war and perished there; two of his older brothers were murdered by the Nazis). After the war, with Budapest occupied by the Soviets, Starker joined the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra as Principal Cello. In 1946 he left Hungary, going to Paris first and two years later to the US. He became the principal cellist of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra whose music director was a fellow Hungarian Jewish conductor Antal Doráti. From 1949 to 1953 Starker was the principal cello of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, then under the direction of Fritz Reiner, another Jewish musician from Budapest. From 1953 to 1958 he occupied the same position at the Chicago Symphony, which at that time was also led by Reiner. In 1958 Starker was appointed professor of cello at Indiana University, Bloomington; he remained there for the rest of his life. He toured widely and made many recordings. 
Starker recorded the complete set of Bach’s cello suites five times, the first recording made in 1950-52, the last – in 1997; that one won a Grammy. Here’s Johann Sebastian Bach’s Suite no. 5 in c minor. János Starker recorded it in New York on April 15th and 15th of 1963. There are many wonderful performances of this piece, we think this is one of the very best.
Starker died in Bloomington, Indiana, on April 28th of 2013.
We’d also like to mention several other names. Hans Werner Henze, an influential and prolific German composer, was born in Dresden on July 1st of 1926. And more than two centuries earlier, on July 2nd of 1714, another German, the great Christoph Willibald Gluck was born in the village of Erasbach, now part of Berching, a town in Bavaria.
We wanted to write about Hanns Eisler but Starker’s 100th anniversary intervened. Eisler, a composer of considerable talent, strong political opinions and an unusual life, was born on July 6th of 1898. We’ll write about him next week.