Sol Babitz was an American violinist, teacher, writer and pioneer of historically informed performance

Historically informed performance

Historically informed performance is an approach in the performance of music and theater. Within this approach, the performance adheres to state-of-the-art knowledge of the aesthetic criteria of the period in which the music or theatre work was conceived...

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His education included studies with Alexander Roman and Carl Flesch at the Berlin Hochschule fuer Musik and with Marcel Chailley in Paris. Babitz was a violinist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1933–37, and then played with Hollywood studio orchestras until 1952.

In 1948 he was a co-founder of the "Early Music Laboratory" (EML) in Los Angeles, investing considerable time in research into historical performance practice, esp. the music of the 17th and 18th century. He also conducted research into historical instrumental techniques, e.g. for violin and harpsichord.

Recordings

• Charles Ives
  Charles Ives
  Charles Edward Ives was an American modernist composer. He is one of the first American composers of international renown, though Ives' music was largely ignored during his life, and many of his works went unperformed for many years. Over time, Ives came to be regarded as an "American Original"...
  
  : Sonata No. 2 for Violin and Piano, mvts. ii–iii (Sol Babitz [vn] and Ingolf Dahl [pf]; for Alco label, issued c1947)

External links

• Brief biography (UCLA library)
• Brief Biography (Music And Dance In California And The West (1948) by Richard Drake Sauners)

Writing/Research

• works (openlibrary.org)