Solovieff, Miriam, 1921-2003

On Feb. 23, 1940, Miriam Solovieff gave a recital at Town Hall in Manhattan. She was 18 and widely known as a violin prodigy, having toured much of the United States, Canada and Europe. It was no surprise, then, that the recital, presenting work by Mozart, Vivaldi and Alexander Glazunov, would receive positive reviews.

What was surprising was the concert’s timing. Just six weeks earlier, Solovieff’s mother and younger sister — her entire family — were murdered by their estranged father. Miriam Soloveff — the “i” was added to the surname later — was born on Nov. 4, 1921, in San Francisco to Elizabeth (Homsky) and Aaron Soloveff, immigrants from Russia. Her father was a cantor with an Orthodox Jewish background. Miriam’s sister, Vivian Ruth, arrived in 1927, when Miriam was 5. By then Miriam had already displayed an aptitude for the piano, though piano playing would ultimately become Vivian’s specialty.

When Miriam was 7, she attended the concert debut of Ruggiero Ricci, one of several young violin prodigies emerging in San Francisco, most notably Yehudi Menuhin. Miriam was so taken with the 10-year-old Ricci’s playing that she tried to emulate it on the piano, before growing adamant that she, too, must take up the violin. Her parents acquiesced — on the condition that she devote equal time to the piano. (That arrangement lasted about a year.)

First she studied with Robert Pollak, who would also teach Isaac Stern, a lifelong friend of Solovieff’s. The accolades continued to accumulate. She appeared with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra in 1933, under the direction of Artur Rodziński, and at the Hollywood Bowl the next year. Generous funding from wealthy San Francisco patrons enabled her to move to New York, where she studied with Louis Persinger, following in the footsteps of Ricci and Menuhin. Her mother and sister accompanied her; her father, then assistant cantor for the Temple Beth Israel congregation in San Francisco, stayed behind. In 1944 she married William Reuben, an Army infantryman in World War II who was later known as a journalist for his investigations into the Rosenberg and Alger Hiss spy cases. The marriage was over within a few years, though the couple did not officially divorce until 1964. Solovieff never remarried. Solovieff stayed in Paris for the remainder of her life. She died at 81 on Oct. 3, 2003, in a hospital there after a long illness. As the journalist Jacqueline Muller wrote in an appreciation in Le Monde, “Miriam Solovieff left as she had lived, quietly, humble, inhabited by her talent that she kept secret deep in her heart, like a child that you carry inside you forever.”

Just four months after her triumphant 1940 concert at Town Hall, and about six months after the destruction of her family, Solovieff, in an interview with The Jewish News of Northern California, reflected on how World War II had not stopped people from craving live music. “Perhaps,” she said, “that’s the function we musicians can perform — with our music. We may be able to help morale — and for a time, at least, take people’s minds away from the terrible suffering in the world.”