ERNST WALLFISCH
Ernest Wallfisch was born in 1920, in Frankfurt am Main,
Germany. Early in his childhood, the family moved to Bucharest, Romania,
where he enjoyed musical training of the highest order. In addition to
an incomparable violin teacher and the customary courses at the Bucharest
Royal Academy of Music, a home atmosphere dominated by devotion, love and
reverence for music directed towards an artistic career. His father was
an amateur violinist whose greatest pleasure were the weekly chamber music
sessions in his home. Very soon, young Ernst was able to take active part
in the performance of those chamber music works which had imbued his mind
ever since he could remember. At the age of fifteen, he yielded to the
strong attraction he felt for the Viola; three years later he made his
first public appearances as violist, in solo as well as in chamber music
concerts. In 1944 Ernst Wallfisch married his pianist, Lory; their Viola-Piano
Duo was heard in 1946 by the great American violinist Yehudi Menuhin who
promptly helped them to come to the United States. En route concerts in
Switzerland and in England have been followed by a rich activity in this
country where the Wallfisch Viola-Piano Duo is steadily gaining appreciation
from critics, colleagues and audiences in many states.