Eugène Ysaÿe came from a background of "artisans", though a large part of his family played instruments. As violinist Arnold Steinhardt recounts, a legend was passed down through the Ysaÿe family about the first violin brought to the lineage:
It was told of a boy whom some woodcutters found in the forest and brought to the village. The boy grew up to be a blacksmith. Once, at a village festival, he astonished everyone by playing the viol beautifully. From then on the villagers took pleasure in dancing and singing to the strains of his viol. One day an illustrious stranger stopped in front of the smithy to have his horse shod. The count's servant saw the viol inside and told the young smith that he had heard a new Italian instrument played by some minstrels at the count's court. That instrument, called the violin, was much better than the viol – its tone was like the human voice and could express every feeling and passion. From that moment the young man no longer took pleasure in his viol. Day and night he was thinking of that wonderful new instrument that could express joy and sorrow and whose tones went straight to the human heart.
Then he had a dream: he saw before him a young woman of indescribable beauty, not unlike his own love, Biethline. She came to him and kissed his brow. The young man awoke and looked at the wall his broken and neglected viol used to hang on and could barely believe his eyes: there, instead of the viol, was a new instrument of beautiful proportions. He put it against his shoulder and drew the bow over the strings, producing sounds that were truly divine. The violin sang in a heartwarming tone: it rejoiced and wept for happiness – and so did the musician. Thus, goes the legend, came the first violin to the Ardennes and to the Ysaÿe family.[1]
Born in Liège, Ysaÿe began violin lessons at age five with his father. He would later recognize his father's teaching as the foundation of everything he knew on his instrument, even though he went on to study with highly reputed masters. In 1867, Ysaÿe entered the Royal Conservatory of Liège to study with Désiré Heynberg, and in the process won a shared second prize with the Viotti 22nd Violin Concerto.[2] He then went on to study with Henryk Wieniawski for two years in Brussels and Henri VieuxtempsinParis.[2]
Studying with these teachers meant that he was part of the so-called Franco-Belgian school of violin playing, which dates back to the development of the modern violin bow by François Tourte. Qualities of this『École』included elegance, a full tone with a sense of drawing a "long" bow with no jerks, precise left hand techniques, and bowing using the whole forearm while keeping both the wrist and upper arm quiet (as opposed to Joseph Joachim's German school of wrist bowing and Leopold Auer's Russian concept of using the whole arm.)
During his tenure as professor at the Conservatoire, Ysaÿe continued to tour ever more widely, visiting all of Europe, Russia, and the United States. Despite health concerns, particularly regarding the condition of his hands, Ysaÿe was at his best when performing, and many prominent composers dedicated major works to him, including Claude Debussy, Camille Saint-Saëns, César Franck, and Ernest Chausson. He arranged for violin and orchestra Saint-Saëns's Étude en forme de valse, which had originally been written for solo piano.
Franck's Violin Sonata in A was written as a wedding present for Ysaÿe and his wife in 1886. Ysaÿe played it often for the rest of his life. Chausson's Poème was Ysaÿe's standard response to a request for a concerto. Joseph Szigeti thought those two dedications demonstrated the enormous respect in which Ysaÿe was held.
As his physical ailments grew more prohibitive, Ysaÿe turned more to teaching, conducting and an early love, composition. Among his most famous works are the six Sonatas for Solo Violin op. 27, the unaccompanied Sonata for Cello, op. 28, one Sonata for Two Violins, eight Poèmes for various instruments (one or two violins, violin and cello, string quartet) and orchestra (Poème élégiaque, Poème de l'Extase, Chant d'hiver, Poème nocturne, among others), pieces for string orchestra without basses (including Exil), several violin concertos, various shorter pieces for violin and piano, two string trios, an early string quintet, and an opera, Peter the Miner, written near the end of his life in the Walloon language.
Ysaÿe had been offered the post of music director of the New York Philharmonic in 1898, but declined it due to his busy solo performance schedule. In 1918, he accepted the music director's position with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, where he remained until 1922 and with which he made several recordings.
Finally, in 1931, suffering from the extreme ravages of diabetes that had necessitated the amputation of his left foot, Eugène Ysaÿe died in his house in Forest, Belgium, 48 Avenue Brugmann, and was interred in the Ixelles CemeteryinBrussels.
As a performer, Ysaÿe was compelling and highly original. Pablo Casals claimed never to have heard a violinist play in tune before Ysaÿe, and Carl Flesch called him "the most outstanding and individual violinist I have ever heard in my life."
Ysaÿe possessed a large and flexible tone, influenced by a considerable variety of vibrato — from no vibrato at all to very intense. He said, "Don't always vibrate, but always be vibrating". His modus operandi was, in his own words: "Nothing which wouldn't have for goal emotion, poetry, heart." The conductor Sir Henry Wood said, "The quality of tone was ravishingly beautiful.... He seemed to get more colour out of a violin than any of his contemporaries."[5]
Possibly the most distinctive feature of Ysaÿe's interpretations was his masterful rubato (in English: "stolen"). Sir Henry Wood said, "Whenever he stole time from one note, he faithfully paid it back within four bars",[5] allowing his accompanist to maintain strict tempo under his free cantilena. Incidentally, this kind of rubato fits the description of Frédéric Chopin's rubato.
Although Ysaÿe was a great interpreter of late Romantic and early modern composers — Max Bruch, Camille Saint-Saëns, and César Franck, who said he was their greatest interpreter[citation needed] — he was admired for his Bach and Beethoven interpretations. His technique was brilliant and finely honed, and in this respect he is the first modern violinist whose technique was without the shortcomings of some earlier artists.
An international violin competition in Brussels was created in his memory: in 1951, this became the violin section of the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition.
Ysaÿe was married twice. His first marriage, on 28 September 1886 in Arlon, was to Louise Bourdau (from Dendermonde), with whom he had three sons and two daughters: Gabriel (1887–1961), Carry (1889–1930), Thérèse called Thésy (1890–1956), Antoine (1894–1979) and Théodore (1898–1934). César Franck presented his Violin Sonata in A to them as a gift on the morning of the wedding, and after a hurried rehearsal Ysaÿe performed the piece at the marriage celebration.[7] The sonata had its formal concert premiere in Brussels on 15 December 1886 with Franck in the audience.
After Louise's death (9 February 1924) he married a pupil of his, Jeanette Dincin (1902–1967), 44 years his junior. She was a violinist who in her teens had studied with prominent teachers such as Franz Kneisel, Leopold Auer, and Otakar Ševčík. Ysaÿe met her in 1922 while conductor of the Cincinnati Orchestra. She cared for him in his ailing years. Eugène's only request of her after he died was that she carry on her performances under his name.
His brother was pianist and composer Théo Ysaÿe (1865–1918), and his great-grandson is Marc Ysaÿe, founder-controller of radio Classic 21 and drummer of rock band Machiavel. Eugène Ysaÿe was also close friends with Queen Elisabeth of Belgium, whom he taught violin despite her lack of talent. His widow took over the royal teaching herself after his death, and the queen began the competition in his honor. His granddaughter, Nadine Ysaye Mosbaugh, was a noted concert pianist who toured Europe with José Iturbi before settling down in Canada. She also hosted and performed on a classical radio program on CKAR Radio in Huntsville, Ontario. Ysaÿe's great-grandson, Franc Mosbaugh, is a Canadian musician/singer and award-winning commercial jingle composer.
Ysaÿe was also a friend of Claude Debussy and would sometimes correspond with him by letter.[8] The two had great respect for each other and Ysaÿe was a significant supporter of the younger composer's early career. Debussy dedicated his only string quartet to the violinist, who studied the score with great care.[9] The quartet received its premiere on 29 December 1893 by the Ysaÿe Quartet at the Société Nationale in Paris, to mixed reviews. The virtuoso and the composer also corresponded during the writing of Debussy's Nocturnes.
The Eugène Ysaÿe Collection, housed in the Music Division of the Royal Library of Belgium, combines four decades of purchases with a donation made by the Ysaÿe family in 2007. An essential source for the study of musician's life and works, it includes some 700 letters and autograph scores, over 1,000 printed scores and books, abundant collection of photographs, four films, and about fifty 78 RPM and 33 RPM recordings.[10] A second collection of handwritten and printed scores is conserved in New York at the Juilliard School.[11]
String Quintet, in B minor, for 2 violins, 2 violas and cello『à mon frère Théophile』(1894) [Grave et lent – Allegro] [later arranged for violin and piano/orchestra Op.15]
Sonata for solo cello, in C minor, Op.28 (1924) [1. Grave; 2. Intermezzo; 3. In modo di Recitativo; 4. Finale. Con brio]
Sonata for two violins, in A minor, Op. posth. (1915) [1. Poco lento, maestoso – Allegro fermo; 2. Allegretto poco lento; 3. Finale. Allegro vivo e con fuoco)
String Trio No.1, Op. 33, a.k.a. "Le Chimay" (1927) [Molto lento – Allegro non troppo – Lento ben sostenuto – Allegro non-troppo – Allegro poco presto]
String Trio No.2, Op. 34 (1927) [Allegro assai – Lento]
Au rouet (Poème No.2), for violin and orchestra, Op.13
Chant d'hiver (Poème No.3), in B minor, for violin and orchestra (or piano), Op.15 (1902) [same music of String Quintet]
Méditation, for cello and orchestra, Op.16
Violin Concerto No.?, in G minor, for violin and orchestra, Op.17 (1893,1901,1908,1910) [mss discovered in 2012, reconstructed from 4 ms versions by Sherban Lupu and orchestrated by Sabin Pautza in 2017][14]
Berceuse, in F minor, for violin and orchestra, Op.20
Extase (Poème No.4), for violin and orchestra, Op.21 (dedicated to Mischa Elman)
Sérénade, for cello and orchestra, Op.22
Les neiges d'antan (Poème No.5), for violin and orchestra, Op.23 (1911)
Divertimento, for violin and orchestra (or piano) Op.24 (1921) [1. Molto moderato; 2. Allegro non-troppo vivo]
Amitié (Poème No.6), for 2 violins and orchestra, Op.26
Poème nocturne (Poème No.7), for violin, cello and orchestra, Op.29
Harmonies du soir (Poème No.8), for string quartet and orchestra, Op.31
Fantasia, for violin and orchestra, Op.32
Violin Concerto No.8 (orchestrated by Jacques Ysaÿe) [I. Grave e lento poco mesto; II. Andante non-troppo; III. (with no tempo indication)]
Violin Concerto No.?, in E minor, for violin and orchestra [I. Allegro appassionato non troppo vivo][16][17]
Saltarelle carnavalesque, in A minor, for violin and orchestra (or piano), Op.posth
Piére li houyeû (Pierre le mineur) 1931 (Original in Walloon language, perhaps the only opera composed for a libretto in that language)
The première of Piére li houyeû (the composer's only opera) took place at the Opéra de Liège on 4 March 1931, during a long evening dedicated to the composer's works, in the presence of Queen Elisabeth of Belgium who had been his pupil. Ysaÿe, very ill with diabetes, listened to the performance from his hospital room. The Queen, informed of the seriousness of Ysaÿe's condition, had organised a radio broadcast of the work and Ysaÿe addressed the audience from his room. The work was then performed in Brussels on 25 April. Ysaÿe, transported on a stretcher to a box in the theater, was able to view the performance. He died 18 days later.
The critics were appreciative but the opera did not find a place in the standard repertoire. It was performed again by Opéra Royal de Wallonie in Liege, 25 November 2006. This performance was recorded and is published by the non-profit association[18] in a two CD set accompanied by a book containing the Walloon text and its French, Dutch and English translations, and introductory texts in French, Dutch, German and English. The story is based on an incident that occurred in 1877 during a miners' strike in the Liège region.[19] During clashes with the police, some shots were fired. The wife of a foreman rushed forward to seize a grenade which had been placed in the offices by a striker, but the grenade exploded and she was killed.
L’avièrge di pièr (La vierge de pierre) – not completed, not performed
A complete list of available orchestral works, including concerto works, is available on the Symphony Orchestra Library Center.[20]
^Arnold Steinhardt, Violin Dreams (Mariner Books 2008), pp. 33, 34.
^ abStokes, Frederick A. (2006) [1919]. "Eugène Ysaye". In Martens, Frederick H. (ed.). Violin Mastery (Revised ed.). Mineloa, New York: Dover Publications. pp. 1–7. ISBN978-0-486-45041-4.
^ abMasin, Gwendolyn Carolina Helena (2012). 'Violin Teaching in the New Millennium: In Search of the Lost Instructions of Great Masters - an Examination of Similarities and Differences Between Schools of Playing and How These Have Evolved, or Remembering the Future of Violin Performance' (doctoral thesis). Trinity College Dublin.
^"MISS NELLIE A. HOPE". The Saint Paul Globe. 3 July 1904. p. 40. Retrieved 30 June 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
^ abSir Henry Wood, My Life of Music (Victor Gollancz 1938), pp171, 173.
^the text on the front side of the tomb stone reads: Monument érigé par le Comité National Belge de la Société des Auteurs Compositeurs et Editeurs de Musique. Which translates into: Monument erected by the Belgian National Committee of the Society of authors, composers and music publishers.
^This work, written by Ysaÿe during a tour of Norway in the Spring of 1882, was discovered in 2013 by the Music Division of the Royal Library of Belgium. It was performed for the first time since the 19th century by the violinist Marc Bouchkov and the pianist Georgiy Dubko on 17 October 2014 in the 2014–15 season of the Royal Library's concert series "Musical Treasures of the Royal Library of Belgium"
Ginsburg, Dr. Lev (1980). Ysaÿe (English, Edited by Dr. H.R. Axelrod, translated from Russian by X. M. Danko ed.). Neptune City, New Jersey: Paganiniana Productions, Inc.
