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OSEPH JOACHIM was born of Jewish parents at Kitsee, a small town near Presburg, Hungary, and while very young entered the Conservatory of Music at Vienna, where he studied under the celebrated teacher, Joseph Böhm. He was only twelve years old when his master declared that, as a violinist, he had nothing more to learn, and he appeared before a public audience at Leipzig with a success which placed his future great career beyond a doubt. He, however, studied with the utmost assiduity under the direction of Ferdinand David. At thirty-two, the age in which he is depicted in the first of our two portraits, he was Director of the Royal Concert-hall at Hanover, and was about to marry Amelia Weiss, one of the leading singers of her time, and then chief contralto at the Royal Opera in Hanover. He had already visited most of the European capitals, and was well known in London, then as now, for the extraordinary technical ability and mastery of his instrument which, combined with the feeling and the insight of a born musician, render him probably the greatest violinist who has ever lived, not even excepting Paganini.