Pierre Baillot - Legacy

Legacy

Baillot is considered to have been the last distinguished representative of the great classical school of violin playing in Paris. In his "L'Art du Violon" he points out the chief distinction between the old and the modern style of violin playing to be the absence of the dramatic element in the former, and its predominance in the latter, thus enabling the executive art to follow the progress marked out by the composer, and to bring out the powerful contrasts and enlarged ideas of the modern musical compositions. After the time of Baillot and his contemporaries the style of Paganini became predominant in Paris, but the influence of the Paris school extended to Germany, where Spohr must be considered the direct descendant artistically of Viotti and Rode.