c. 1900

Playing Chamber Music

This violin belonged to Henry Brender. He was a musical prodigy who grew up in Romania and studied in the world famous academies in Vienna and Budapest until WWII. During the war, he was sent to a forced labor camp and took his violin. He managed to escape the camp with his violin and joined a group of Jewish partisan fighters. Henry survived the war and became a successful soloist with the Bucharest Philharmonic. However, life under the communist government of Romania was difficult, and Henry was imprisoned for six months and removed from the orchestra for trying to emigrate to Israel. Henry was finally able to emigrate in 1960 and soon became a violinist with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, where he played second violin until his retirement in 1985.