Svend Asmussen, 100, master of jazz violin . By Peter Keepnews New York
Times . NEW YORK - Svend Asmussen, a Danish jazz violinist whose
collaborators over more than 70 years included Duke Ellington, Benny
Goodman, Indian violinist L. Subramaniam, and bluegrass mandolinist
David Grisman, died Tuesday. He was 100. Mr. Asmussen's son Claus
confirmed the death to The Associated Press. He did not say where his
father died. Mr. Asmussen was one of the first world-class jazz
musicians from Scandinavia and one of the first jazz violinists of
note. The jazz writer Doug Ramsey placed him among "the handful (or
fewer) of violinists who in the 1930s proved their instrument capable
of swing and emotional expression at the highest jazz level. Inspired
by recordings of American violinists Joe Venuti and Stuff Smith, Mr.
Asmussen began leading a small group in Copenhagen in the mid-1930s. By
the end of the decade his group was regularly opening for, and
impressing, visiting American musicians such as Fats Waller. An
ebullient performer, Mr. Asmussen was known for his onstage singing and
clowning as well as his playing. He rarely performed outside Europe,
but he did tour the United States in the late 1950s and early '60s with
the Swe-Danes, a vocal and instrumental trio with Swedish vocalist
Alice Babs and Danish guitarist Ulrik Neumann. Among his more
celebrated recordings were two albums made in the 1960s that teamed him
with other great jazz violinists: "Duke Ellington's Jazz Violin
Session," with Stéphane Grappelli and Ray Nance, and "The Violin
Summit," with Grappelli, Smith, and Jean-Luc Ponty. He also recorded
with pianist John Lewis and vibraphonist Lionel Hampton, as well as
with Subramaniam, on the 1978 album "Garland," and Grisman, on the 1987
album "Svingin' With Svend. He continued performing and recording well
into the 21st century. Sven Harald Christian Asmussen was born in
Copenhagen on Feb. 28, 1916, and began taking piano lessons at 5 before
switching to violin. He attended dental school but, he said in a 1955
interview, did not have "the least interest in dentistry" and was
playing music professionally before he was out of his teens. He leaves
his wife, Ellen Bick Meier, and three children from his marriage to
Annegrethe Thomassen, who died in 2000.
