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ZINO FRANCESCATTI, 56, is a lineal musical descendant of Paganini: his Italian-born father, who emigrated to Marseille to become concertmaster of the local symphony, had studied with Paganini's only pupil. Fritz Kreisler happened to play in Marseille when Francescatti was a boy. and the youngster never got over it. His father wanted him to become a lawyer, but Francescatti had his mind made up; he would be a fiddler. He made a success ful Paris debut in 1925, later toured England with Maurice Ravel and English Soprano Maggie Teyte. He was already a major name in Europe when he made his U.S. debut with the New York Philharmonic in 1939. His sweet and singing tone and his flowing, sinuous style were an immediate success. Francescatti summers at his villa on the Riviera, seldom plays more than three concerts a week when he is touring. "They know me at my best on my records," says he. "This is what they want to hear, and they are right."
DAVID OISTRAKH, 53, was already a legend before he briefly left Russia to conquer the U.S. in 1955. Son of a poor Jewish bookkeeper in Odessa, he started playing a one-eighth-sized violin when he was five, supported his family as a wandering fiddler after graduation from the Odessa Conservatory. With his 1935 victory in the Leningrad Concours and a 1937 victory in the first Brussels violin concours, he became the leading violinist of Russia. Western audiences were delighted by his warmth and humor: for all his success, noted a Westerner who traveled with him, he still seemed like a character out of Sholom Aleichem—the little village fiddler who, like one of Aleichem's wonderful rabbis, had burst beyond the confines of his environment.
A romantic of the old school, Oistrakh favors far slower tempos than most modern violinists, often imbues the music of Brahms, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky with the sort of kindling warmth that has reminded many a listener of Oistrakh's early idol, Fritz Kreisler. Whatever he plays—classics or occasional moderns—Oistrakh exudes conviction. "When the difficult parts come," says Violinist Francescatti, "he does not try to go around them. In fact, he shows you how difficult they are. He slows down, and this is the honesty of a great artist."