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Ivan Galamian, Armenian-American Violinist, Pedagogue, and Educator – Part Two

Other facets of the great Ivan Galamian’s violin teaching can further be found in his Contemporary Violin Techinque (Galamian, Neumann, 1997).

Here, one finds a collection of small but essential technical exercises, as well as a variety of rhythm and bowing patterns, some of which can be traced to his training with Lucien Capet (1873-1908), the great exponent of violin bowing technique, and renowned French pedagogue. 

(Galamian always held daily scales and arpeggios as fundamental for violin teaching and development.)

Understood by the music historian Robin Stowell as combining both ‘the best traditions of the Russian and French violin schools’ in The Cambridge Companion to the Violin (1992), Ivan Galamian was himself the student of outstanding teachers like Konstantin Mostras at the Philharmonic Society in Moscow from 1916 to 1922, and then a pupil of Capet at the Paris Conservatoire.

Later a teacher at the Russian Conservatory in Paris as well as a soloist in Europe, bridging both his Russian and French traditions of study, he later moved to North America where he taught at the Juilliard School. 

Also appointed professor at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, Galamian remained at the Juilliard School until his death in 1981. He is known also for founding the esteemed Meadowmount School of Music for gifted young musical prodigies in the year 1944, and is considered one of North America’s greatest and most influential and pioneering violin pedagogues of the 20th century.

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