A violinist friend once asked me to name my favourite violinist. I replied: “playing what music?” He agreed this was a fair answer, because a violinist who plays to perfection in Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert may well not be the same as the one who plays to perfection in Brahms, Elgar, Prokoviev or Shostakovich. With favourite conductors it's the same problem. Furtwängler and Klemperer are the greatest for me, but I don't fancy either conducting Debussy's La Mer, or Berlioz's Symphone Fantastique.
20th century violinists? Hordes of them, but particularly Jascha Heifetz, Fritz Kreisler, Arthur Grumiaux, and Ginette Neveu. Come the 21st century things become even more complictated, but I have a soft spot for Renaud Capuçon, Tianwa Yang, Lisa Batiashvili, Arabella Steinbacher, and Alina Ibrabimova. Four women, and one man; I think that's called “inclusive” in current parlance, at least by women.
For pianists, I have less of a problem: be it for Bach, Scarlatti, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert or Schuman there is only one favourite candidate. Clara Haskil. I have just been listening to her many CDs, recorded mainly in the 1950s. Mozart piano concertos Nos. 19, 20 and 27. Beethoven's Op 111 piano sonata. 11 Scarlatti keyboard sonatas. The Scarlatti and the Schubert D 960 come on an Archipel CD (recorded 1950 and 1951). A recital in Ludwigsburg in 1953 has Haskil playing Bach, Scarlatti, Beethoven, Schumann … and a bonus of Debussy and Ravel (Südwestrundfunk). A wonderful treat. I am currently having a serious weeding-out of my over-inflated collection of recordings. But never anything by Clara Haskil who just sat down and played the music, as it was written and as it should be played. One of a kind. I admired her in duo sonatas of Mozart and Beethoven with Arthur Grumiaux. I admire her as a soloist, or with an orchestra.
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