Adolf Busch

Adolf Georg Wilhelm Busch (8 August 1891 – 9 June 1952) was a German-Swissviolinist, conductor, and composer.

Busch was born in Siegen in Westphalia. He studied at the Cologne Conservatory with Willy Hess and Bram Eldering. His composition teacher was Fritz Steinbach but he also learned much from his future father-in-law Hugo Grüters in Bonn.

In 1912, Busch founded the Vienna Konzertverein Quartet, consisting of the principals from the Konzertverein orchestra, which made its debut at the 1913 Salzburg Festival. After World War I, he founded the Busch Quartet, which from the 1920–21 season included Gösta Andreasson, violin, Karl Doktor, viola, and Paul Grümmer, cello. The quartet was in existence with varying personnel until 1951.

The additional member of the circle was Rudolf Serkin, who became Busch's duo partner at 18 and eventually married Busch's daughter, Irene, 1935 in Basel. The Busch Quartet and Serkin became the nucleus of the Busch Chamber Players, founded in Basel, a forerunner of modern chamber orchestras.

In 1927, with the rise of Adolf Hitler, Busch decided he could not in good conscience stay in Germany, so he emigrated to Basel, Switzerland. Busch was not Jewish and was popular in Germany, but firmly opposed Nazism from the beginning. On 1 April 1933, he repudiated Germany altogether and in 1938, he boycotted Italy. As the Nazis tried to convince him to return to Germany, he declared that he would "return with joy on the day that Hitler, Goebbels und Göring are publicly hanged." In 1935, he became a Swiss citizen of Riehen, Basel. During 12 years in Basel and besides his many concerts around the world, he founded a chamber orchestra in Basel, was a co-founder of the Lucerne Festival in 1938, together with Arturo Toscanini and his conducting brother Fritz Busch, and taught many students in Basel, among them Yehudi Menuhin. On the outbreak of World War II, Busch emigrated from Basel to the United States in 1939, where he eventually settled in Vermont. There, he was one of the founders with Rudolf Serkin of the Marlboro Music School and Festival.

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