Vadim Gluzman Returns to the MSO
David Lewellen
PUBLISHED
Tagged Under: 2024.25 Season, Guest Artist
A great many influences go into making an international violinist.
“I studied with so many people in so many countries,” says Vadim Gluzman, who will appear with the Milwaukee Symphony Oct 11-12, “but if you took one of them away, I’d be a different person. Each one of them left a different mark on me personally.”
Even so, he is quick to name three major formative presences. His first teacher in Latvia, Romans Šnē, was “very methodical, very organized, but at the same time we wanted to play well for him. He encouraged respect.” Then in his late teens, Arkady Fomin helped him move past his desire to quit the violin. “You talk to any artist, it happens to all of us — a period of self-doubt,” Gluzman said. “I didn’t see where to go and wondered if I should do something else. Arkady didn’t let me do that and inspired me to follow him.”
And his last major teacher, Dorothy DeLay at Juilliard, was perfect for the beginning of his career as a soloist. “She taught me things like score reading and how to talk to a conductor — I had no idea, simply from lack of experience.”
As a busy soloist, Gluzman no longer takes lessons, but growth continues. “Every orchestra I play with, I react to their sound and interpretation,” he said. “If you have an open mind, you pick things up from thin air.”
In his teaching position at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, Gluzman now has a chance to pay it forward. “I’ve been through the tough Russian way of teaching, which I don’t recommend,” he said. At the advanced level, psychology and emotional balance are often more important than technique, “finding a human solution rather than moving your muscles to the right or the left.”
Gluzman plays the “Auer” Stradivarius, named for one of the most distinguished violinists of the 19th century, Leopold Auer, and now on long-term loan to him from the Stradivarius Society of Chicago. Prices for great antique instruments have risen to the point that even most famous soloists cannot afford to own one, but Gluzman is philosophical about the situation. “It’s a tool, but it’s also a piece of art,” he said. Some great instruments sit in their owners’ vaults, and the reality is that “by using this instrument, I’m also abusing it. Fortunately, I have a very good violin restorer. I’m a custodian, and my job is to make sure that someone can play it after me.”
In Milwaukee, Gluzman will perform the Violin Concerto No. 2 by Karol Szymanowski, a Polish composer of the early 20th century. “It’s off the beaten path, a wonderful piece, and quite conservative by today’s standards,” he said. “It deserves our attention.”
In his previous appearance with the MSO, Gluzman performed the Tchaikovsky violin concerto, one of the warhorses of the repertoire. Performing a less familiar piece offers more freedom, he said, and when the audience comes “with no knowledge of what to expect, you’re participating in creating the work, part of the experience.”
Szymanowski used the sounds of Polish folk music in the piece, and Gluzman sees a resemblance to what Bartók was doing in Hungary around the same time. And the large orchestra is “not just accompanying me. It’s really a collaboration.”
At this stage of his career, most of his visits with orchestras are return engagements, “and that’s always more exciting, if it was a positive experience,” he said. “The orchestra remembers what you sound like, and you start from a higher level of understanding. But some of the personnel will have changed, and they have a new hall. But I remember the orchestra being fantastic — very flexible, very enthusiastic, very welcoming atmosphere.”
And another reason to enjoy his Milwaukee visit is that it’s close enough to Gluzman’s home in Glenview, Illinois, that he can sleep in his own bed. How much time does he get there? “Ask my wife. Not much,” he said wryly. “It comes with the territory.”
