Bloomsbury Double Stopping: How Migration Shaped the Careers of Australia’s Celebrity Violinists

Double Stopping traces the migration of celebrity violinists to and from Australia to investigate routes of contact between metropoles and peripheries, and the impact of world wars and political instability on patterns of musical migration. Mobility and migration were integral to the careers of twentieth-century concert artists. Double Stopping explores how the increasing speed of travel and communication, the development of new media and the rise of celebrity culture enabled outstanding musicians to construct a global career. Documenting movement through and between Belgium, Britain, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Russia and emerging hubs in Australia, New Zealand and the United States, this book explores aspects of musical migrant culture including the influence of teachers who were themselves migrants, the role of arts organizations in promoting (or hampering) the careers of immigrant musicians, the impact of the explicitly racist ‘White Australia’ policy on immigrant artists whose mission was to propagate whiteness and cultural elitism, the obstacles faced by women as aspiring soloists as well as immigrants, and the ways that migration re-oriented or re-shaped career trajectories. It argues that an approach to the history of music performance through the lens of migration can bring into view lives that have been obscured because they crossed borders and transgressed boundaries. With reference to migration studies, empire studies, postcolonialist theory, celebrity studies and studies of violinists and violin culture, Double Stopping interweaves life stories and migration history to explore the interconnectedness of migration and music-making in an era of modernization and globalization.