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Reviewed by:
  • Maxim Vengerov: Violin Masterclass at the Royal Academy of Music, London, Benjamin Britten, Violin concerto opus 15: Violin masterclass, and: Ana Chumachenko at the Verbier Festival Academy, Violin masterclass, and: Gábor Takács-Nagy at the Verbier Festival Academy, Johannes Brahms, Piano quartet no. 3 in C minor: Chamber music masterclass, and: Aaron Rosand: Celebrating a Life in Music, and: Aaron Rosand: The Teacher
  • Sabra Statham
Maxim Vengerov: Violin Masterclass at the Royal Academy of Music, London, Benjamin Britten, Violin concerto opus 15: Violin masterclass. DVD. Directed by Mischa Scorer. Bristol, England: Masterclass Media Foundation, 2008. MMF 2-022. £11.99 individual/£19.98 institution.
Ana Chumachenko at the Verbier Festival Academy, Violin masterclass. DVD. Directed by Mischa Scorer. Bristol, England: Masterclass Media Foundation, 2009. MMF 2-027. £23.99 individual/£39.98 institution.
Gábor Takács-Nagy at the Verbier Festival Academy, Johannes Brahms, Piano quartet no. 3 in C minor: Chamber music masterclass. DVD. Directed by Mischa Scorer. Bristol, England: Masterclass Media Foundation, 2008. MMF 014. £17.99 individual/£29.98 institution.
Aaron Rosand: Celebrating a Life in Music. DVD. Produced and directed by Sheila Halpern and Steve Halpern. [Pleasantville, New York]: SMH Music, 2007. SMH7878. $29.95.
Aaron Rosand: The Teacher. DVD. Produced and directed by Sheila Halpern and Steve Halpern. [Pleasantville, New York]: SMH Music, 2010. $29.95.

Since 2006, The Masterclass Media Foundation has been systematically filming classes conducted by some of the world’s greatest classical performers and teachers. Founded as a non-profit by documentary director and producer Mischa Scorer, the foundation has produced 35 DVDs that include lessons by such well known instrumentalists as Maxim Vengerov on violin, Steven Isserlis on cello, and András Schiff at the piano. The five-year goal is to create a library of over 100 DVDs that will cover a wide range of genres including instrumental solos, chamber music, conducting, and even early music.

These films are wonderful. Top-notch performers and teachers give thoughtful and articulate advice on how to play and interpret some of the greatest musical works of all times. The classes are beautifully filmed in an artistic yet unobtrusive way and the overall sound is very good. [End Page 165]

Maxim Vengerov is included in ten of the twelve violin DVDs. At age 32, he is Professor of Violin at the Royal Academy of Music in London. In 2004 Vengerov was awarded both a Grammy and an Edison Award for his recording of the Britten Violin Concerto and after watching this video it is obvious why he is featured so prominently. His class begins with Giovanni Guzzi, accompanied by piano, performing the first movement of the Britten concerto after which Vengerov launches into a lengthy discourse on his artistic conception of the overall piece. Next Vengerov works through the first movement of the concerto with the student. His relaxed nature and ability to generate a positive interpersonal dynamic is communicated on camera. Both student and teacher are engaged in the lesson, and under the direction of the master, this initially intellectual and sterile work is enlivened with drama and emotion. The class was filmed at the Royal Academy before a live audience. The overall tone quality of the instruments was somewhat diminished in this setting but for the most part the class translated well onto video.

Ana Chumachenko, now a Professor at Die Hochschule für Musik und Theater München, studied violin first with her own father, a disciple of Leopold Auer’s, and later with Yehudi Menuhin and Joseph Szigeti. This class, devoted to Mozart’s Concerti 3, 4, and 5, was filmed at the Verbier Festival Academy and was arranged especially for this series. As such, there was no audience and the Verbier set offered superb sound and more artistic videography than that shot at the Royal Academy. The first performer, Eldbjorg Hemsing, gives a beautiful performance of the first movement of Concerto No. 3, however, the videography in this lesson is extremely distracting. The camera focuses so closely on her face that her hands and instrument are constantly moving in and out of the screen. Also, Chumachenko is sometimes difficult to understand because she...

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