Background

David Blum was born on September 7, 1935 in Los Angeles, California, United States.

Education

Blum studied composition and conducting at the Juilliard School of Music.

Career

David Blum was a noted conductor who toured the United States and Europe. Blum also organized orchestras and wrote memorable profiles of musicians. His interest in orchestras saw fruition when he was seventeen and he organized the Young Artists Chamber Orchestra in Los Angeles. In performance at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre, the group performed Blum’s Tone Poem to Cyrano de Bergerac. He continued to conduct the group, which changed its name to the David Blum Chamber Orchestra. From 1956 to 1961 he toured the United States and Europe as a guest conductor. In 1961 in New York City, he assembled the Esterhazy Orchestra, which went on to record on the Vanguard Classics label.

Blum moved to Switzerland in 1969 and began four years as a guest conductor with the English Chamber Orchestra and the RIAS Berlin. From 1973 to 1982 he directed the Orchestre Symphonique Lausannois in Switzerland, and in 1977 he began a stint with the Orchestre Symphonique Genevois. Many of his concerts and recordings featured the music of Bach, Haydn, Mozart, and Telemann. In addition to his performances, Blum was a chief examiner in music for the International Baccalaureate. He also wrote about musicians for the New Yorker, New York Times, and other periodicals. Blum wrote Casals and the Art of Interpretation, Paul Tortelier: A Self-Portrait in Conversation with David Blum, and The Art of Quartet Playing; The Guarneri Quartet in Conversation with David Blum. Blum tried his hand at other media as well. He adapted The Friend of the Family by Fedor Dostoevsky into a three-act play, and he later filmed a documentary about pain and art.

David Blum died of cancer on April 17, 1998 in Kirkland, Washington.

Achievements

• David Blum was an outstanding musician who managed to present his own vision of classical pieces, which made him a high-demand conductor in all over the world.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Art of Quartet Playing: The Guarneri Quartet in Conversation with David Blum

    (This collection of conversations with the Guarneri member...)

    1986
  • Casals and the Art of Interpretation

    ("Now we have an authoritative guide to this great artist'...)

    1980

Politics

According to the London Times: “During the Vietnam War, Blum campaigned tirelessly for an end to hostilities, organized peace concerts and was even arrested at one anti-war protest.”

Views

Quotations: "It is my hope that the reader will look upon music, as I have experienced it during my illness as a metaphor for his or her own experience. Each of us has a store of inner gifts. At a time of crisis, any powerful image that arises spontaneously from within oneself - in whatever form - brings with it a creative potential. A friend of mine, a cancer patient, finds precious moments of serenity in conversing with the kindly grandfather she had known only in her childhood. That is her music."

Personality

Physical Characteristics: In 1989 David Bloom was diagnosed with cancer, which caused his death in 1998.

Interests

• psychology, spirituality

• Philosophers & Thinkers

  Carl Gustav Jung

• Writers

  Edmond Rostand

• Music & Bands

  Franz Joseph Haydn

Connections

David Blum was married to a woman named Sara. They had two children - Pamina and Ardan Michael.

Wife:

Sara Blum

Daughter:

Pamina Blum

Son:

Ardan Michael Blum

Friend:

Paul Tortelier

Friend:

Pablo Casals

References

• Contemporary Authors, Vol. 166 This volume of Contemporary Authors contains biographical information on approximately 300 modern writers.
  1998
• Paul Tortelier: A Self-Portrait in Conversation with David Blum With his friend and colleague David Blum, Tortelier has given us a unique and intimate self-portrait which will delight readers as his music thrills audiences.
  1984