Great Violinists: Sarasate

The effervescent Pablo de Sarasate fluttered across late 19th-century concert stages like a butterfly, setting a dazzling example of light-fingered virtuosity and providing a gloriously frivolous counterpoise to the seriousness of his main rivals, the older Joseph Joachim and the younger Eugène Ysaÿe.

Pedagogical background

Pablo Martín Melitón de Sarasate y Navascuéz was born in Pamplona on 10 March 1844 and at five was started on the violin by his father Miguel, an artillery bandmaster. Aged eight, he made his debut in La Coruña and at ten, sponsored by an aristocratic lady, he went to Madrid to study with Manuel Rodriguéz, concertmaster at the Teatro de la Zarzuela. In 1856 he played at the Royal Opera House and in a command performance for Queen Isabella II. She gave him a 1724 Stradivari and, with other sponsors, helped set him up to study in Paris.

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