Tag Archives: Violin

By Chris McGovern courtesy of The Glass

Violinist Jennifer Choi, player of an extensive repertoire for the instrument, and interpreter of composers as diverse as Mozart, John Zorn, and Rogers/Hammerstein (I neglected to ask her about her stint as concertmaster for the touring company of South Pacific; next time!) was recently given a boost of profile in the online classical media when she joined the esteemed quartet ETHEL, with whom she plans on giving her strongest efforts as a musician. On a beautiful late summer afternoon in NY, we hung out on an outdoor restaurant patio and had this wonderful interview.

CM: How is your take on your classical and your new music repertoires?

JC: I was trained classically and it was pretty rigorous–hardcore teachers who wanted a certain standard repertoire to be in your fingers and in a certain way, and I was always listening to the great violinists and to great musicians…Nathan Milstein, Henryk Szeryng, that old school…Michael Rabin, Perlman, I listened to Perlman when I was growing up ’cause my mom had these records in the house, and she had symphonies playing all the time. But then, when I started playing new music, I guess I was using the same approach that I had learned with classical music, and you’re using your technique–it is music after all, and there’s a thing called execution, you have to execute it well…It still has to be clean and has to be fiery. the approach is similar, although the music can be so completely different.
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