Arnold Rosé was at the hub of musical life in Vienna for more than half a century – and it took the Anschluss of 1938 to shift him. His destiny was intimately bound up with the two most controversial men in Viennese music at the turn of the century, Gustav Mahler and Arnold Schoenberg; and he represented the final flourish of the 19th-century Viennese string style.

Rosé was appointed Concertmaster of the Vienna Philharmonic by Hans Richter in 1881 and took part in the premières of many staples of today’s repertoire. Rosé worked closely with such conductors as Richard Strauss, Arturo Toscanini, Franz Schalk, Felix Weingartner, Clemens Krauss, Hans Knappertsbusch and Wilhelm Furtwängler. Most significantly, Rosé performed under Gustav Mahler who was appointed Director in 1896 (Rosé became the brother-in-law of the composer/conductor in 1902).

Sir Adrian Boult simply declared Rosé to be ‘Europe’s greatest orchestral leader of his time’. In and remained in that distinguished post for 57 years until the Anschluss forced him to leave in 1938. As well as establishing the Rosé String Quartet, which was which was considered – not least by Brahms – a major advance on the quar-tet ensembles that had preceded it, Rosé was also a scintillating soloist in his prime. As the records made from 1900 to 1910 on this release testify, he had a fluid technique, pristine vibrato sparingly, and refined taste.