AUER, LEOPOLD:
Hungarian violinist; son of a poor house-painter; born in Veszprim, Hungary, June 7, 1845. His musical talent manifested itself early. When only four years old he marched in front of the revolutionary troops, beating the drum, and exciting patriotic enthusiasm among the spectators. He received his first musical education from Ridley Kolene at the Conservatory at Budapest; then went to the Vienna Conservatory, where he studied under Dont (1857-58); and completed his studies with Joachim at Berlin. He was musical conductor at Düsseldorf from 1863 to 1865, and at Hamburg from 1866 to 1868. On the invitation of the St. Petersburg Musical Society he succeeded Wienia wski as professor of the violin at the conservatory there. Appointed soloist of the imperial theaters (1873), with the title "court-soloist to the Czar," he conducted the concerts of the imperial court-singers (1880-81), and later led the concerts of the Russian Imperial Musical Society (1887-92). Auer still occupies this last position (1902). From 1881 to 1888 he made a number of tours through Europe as a solo violinist, and participated in the musical festivals at Carlsruhe (1885) and Düsseldorf (1888).
His eminence as a talented musical instructor is attested by the many renowned violin-players that have been among his more than forty pupils; ofthem Kolakovski, soloist of the Imperial Theater at Moscow; Krasnokutski, Pusternakov, Galkin, Mlynarski, Korguyev, and Krüger, the last four soloists of the Imperial Musical Society of St. Petersburg, and many more celebrated artists of the imperial theaters of St. Petersburg. Some of his compositions, among them "Tarantelle de Concert" and "Rhapsodie Hongroise" for violin and piano, and transpositions for the violin, have been published by Bote and Back in Berlin, and by Fr. Kistner in Leipsic.
- Entziklopedicheski Slovar, ii. St. Petersburg, 1893;
- Ehrlich-Legge, Celebrated Violinists, 1897, s.v.;
- Riemann, Musiklexikon, 1900, s.v.;
- Baker, Biographical Dict. of Musicians, New York, 1900.
