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Edvin Marton: Rockin’ out with a 1699 Strad

If superstar virtuoso Niccolò Paganini were alive today, he might sympathize with a classical crossover artist like Edvin Marton.
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December 4, 2014

If superstar virtuoso Niccolò Paganini were alive today, he might sympathize with a classical crossover artist like Edvin Marton. Paganini’s early 19th-century audiences were hypnotized and thrilled when he performed his fiery Caprices for unaccompanied violin. Some even swooned, a far cry from the unadventurous classical format and sedate audiences most of us encounter in contemporary concert life.

But Marton, an Emmy Award-winning Hungarian violinist and composer, hopes to rock his audience when his “Prince of the Violin” tour stops at the Valley Performing Arts Center’s Plaza del Sol Concert Hall on Dec. 6, and the following night at Sherwood Auditorium at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego in La Jolla.

Marton, a Romantic virtuoso in a classical crossover genre he’s helping to develop and refine, finds inspiration in Beethoven’s famous opening theme of the Fifth Symphony, movie themes and even in songs by British rock bands like Coldplay. Marton’s original song, “Fanatico,” has so far received 1,140,348 hits on YouTube. Filmed in 2013 at the Great Wall of China, the video is a good example of Marton’s electrifying showmanship.

“When I do my shows, I want people to fly away with me to a different planet,” Marton said during a conversation at the Coral Tree Cafe in Brentwood. “I want to grab my audience and make them feel the grooves of the melody and rhythms. The blend of classical and rock — this is what brings out the emotions.”

Marton said his “all-girl band” for the upcoming show at Plaza del Sol Concert Hall includes a drummer, keyboardist, bassist and guitarist. 

The violinist said he owes much of his crossover success to a solid classical foundation. He studied at several of the world’s greatest conservatories, including the Juilliard School in New York, and still performs purely classical concerts. After his two Southern California dates, he’s scheduled to tour with the Vienna Strauss Orchestra in China.

“To become a successful crossover artist, you first have to become a great classical performer,” Marton said, “to have the skills to go beyond classical performance. People have to feel your technique, your sound, is secure. You need at least 15 very hard years to become a crossover artist.”

Marton’s training began early. His Catholic father and Jewish mother were violinists, and his maternal grandmother played double bass in a jazz band in Hungary. “Maybe I got this rock ’n’ roll feeling from her,” Marton said. And perhaps her natural sense of showmanship as well: “She would flip over the bass while playing.”

His grandmother’s mother, Marton was told, died during World War II, hiding in a forest trying to avoid a roundup of Jews. “They took her,” he said. “There was no chance. My grandmother was 20 at the time, and they took her mother. It was a hard time.”

Now based in the San Fernando Valley, with two young sons, Marton recalled growing up in a small, very musical Hungarian community. “My younger sister thought every single person in the world played the violin,” he said, “but she eventually became a pianist and plays in my band in Europe.”

Marton started the violin at 5 and was performing at age 8; he said his father withheld breakfast unless he practiced for two hours every morning. “He was really tough,” Marton said. “I didn’t understand it then; now I realize he was right.”

Until recently, Marton performed on a celebrated loaner: Paganini’s own Stradivarius violin. For his upcoming dates, he’s playing another rare instrument, a 1699 Stradivarius valued at $7 million. “The violin is a masterpiece in itself,” Marton said. “There’s that golden varnish on the best wood; wood already several centuries old when it was used to make the instrument.”

He said he always spotlights a solo classical piece in his show, giving audiences a chance to hear some of his technical fireworks — double-stop harmonics, ricochet bowing, left- and right-hand pizzicato, fingered octaves — and more. “You hear the pure sound of the Stradivarius,” Marton said. “I respect classical music and composers — Paganini, Vivaldi, Mozart. They are all incredible. So I go from rock to classical, and classical to rock, creating this bridge between the two worlds.”

Marton recalled that his teacher, the great California-born violinist Ruggiero Ricci, who was famous for his accounts of Paganini’s daunting Caprices, taught him the most about stage attitude and communication. 

“He would teach me to be relaxed and look at people,” Marton said. “Ricci taught me to love the audience, to break this gate between them and the stage. I feel like [lead vocalist of the hard-rock band Guns N’ Roses] Axl Rose when I’m up there, and this you cannot feel when you play Tchaikovsky. I was hungry for this emotion, because it’s not normal, not usual, at classical concerts. At my shows, you can get up, dance and scream, hug. I don’t want restrictions.”

“Edvin Marton: Prince of the Violin” at the Valley Performing Arts Center’s Plaza del Sol Concert Hall on Dec. 6. For more information, visit

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