Description

Max Jaffa (1911-1991) was the pre-eminent light music violinist of his generation, a universally popular figure with a career spanning seventy years, famous as leader of the Palm Court Orchestra and of his trio, and a household favourite through his regular radio broadcasts. Since 2000 I have been playing on a wonderful Peter Guarnerius violin that previously belonged to him. About three years ago I was offered his sheet music library by his family (whom Id got to know well in the intervening years), reuniting it with the violin, and during the first Coronavirus lockdown in 2020 my wife, Saoko, and I combed through the violin and piano pieces, discovering and performing in online concerts a huge number of gorgeous salon pieces, some well-known but many forgotten or undiscovered. [Simon Blendis]