Classical music

Arthur Rubinstein

Arthur Rubinstein (1887-1982), one of the greatest pianists of the twentieth century, discovered the Riviera as a teenager. Born in Lodz into a family with little inclination for music, a prodigy presented to the violinist Joseph Joachim, he studied in Berlin thanks to a scholarship obtained by the latter. It was Joachim again who sent him to Ignacy Paderewski, pianist and future Polish statesman, settled at Riond Bosson near Morges, who invited his compatriot to spend the summer in Switzerland. From there, around 1905, Rubinstein stayed at the Caux Palace above Montreux: the hotel was only three years old, and the young man compared it to “a motionless ocean liner”. Curious about everything, reading in Polish, Russian and German, he mixed throughout his life with Saint-Saëns, Casals, Caruso, Sarah Bernhardt, Colette, Picasso, Diaghilev, Stravinsky and Ansermet.