Victor Martin
I am saddened to hear of the passing of violinist Victor Martin. I owe him a lot; he was my first Maestro with the Chamber Players of Toronto when I was just 18 years old and he arranged for me to go study with his friend Franco Petracchi. Victor and I played the Bottesini Grand Duo for at least fifty performances with the Chamber Players. He left Toronto to go back to Madrid and become Concertmaster of the Spanish National Orchestra in the late 1970's.
In this video he is playing with his cousin Jose Luis Garcia the former leader of the English Chamber Orchestra who passed away a few years ago; I'll never forget the excitement they caused when they played the Navarra with the CPT; that was the best thing I had ever heard! Jose Luis also became a big influence for me and we played fairly often together in the 1980's not only with the Grand Duo but on one really notable occasion (for me at least) the Beethoven "Archduke Trio" with the wonderful pianist, Robert Silverman. I'm very thankful that I got a last chance to see Victor in Madrid a couple of years ago when the LSO spent a whole weekend there.