The Ukrainian violinist Igor Oistrakh, son of David Oistrakh, has died at the age of 90. Following lessons with his father, he attended the Central Music School in Moscow from the age of 12 and then, in his late teens, studied at the Moscow Conservatory, from which he graduated in 1955. While still a student, he won several major prizes, including First Prize at the Wieniawski Competition in 1952. By 1958 he had been appointed to the staff of the Moscow Conservatory, initially assisting his father.

Comparisons to Oistrakh senior were inevitable, despite their obviously different interpretative styles; as Boris Schwarz wrote for Grove Music, ‘Igor has a musical profile of his own: his approach to music is leaner and more modern, his tone cooler and less emotional’. Perhaps these differences were intentional: ‘I never thought of becoming similar to my father,’ Igor told the journalist Bill Newman in 2003. ‘I never wanted to copy.’

Growing up in Stalin’s Soviet Union provided many obstacles for the Oistrakh family, yet Igor was still able to benefit from his father’s connections with the great Soviet composers, including Shostakovich, who personally oversaw Igor’s rehearsals of his Second Concerto, originally written for Oistrakh senior, and Prokofiev.

Igor was the first of the Oistrakh family to perform in Britain when he was brought to the country in 1953 by impresario Victor Hochhauser. His concert at the Royal Albert Hall, during which he played the Beethoven and Khachaturian Concertos, was a huge success and resulted in audiences accepting him as an artist in his own right. Eight years later, in 1961, he and his father appeared in concert together in Britain for the first time, performing Bach’s Double in London and Manchester. They would also go on to perform with Igor as soloist and his father as conductor, notably in a concert at the RAH with Yehudi Menuhin and the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra in 1963 which culminated in all three performing in Vivaldi’s Triple Concerto under Kyril Kondrashin.

Igor made several recordings, many of which were with his father. A new DVD on ICA Classics, capturing father and son at the Royal Albert Hall and the Royal Festival Hall in 1962 and 1963 respectively, caught Gramophone reviewer Jeremy Nicholas’s attention as recently as the September 2011 issue. Their performance of Bach’s Double under Colin Davis was a ‘richly rewarding experience’, said Nicholas, with Igor’s vibrato blending with Oistrakh père ‘with a magical serenity verging on perfection’.

Igor’s son Valery continues the Oistrakh line of violin-playing; on occasion he appeared in concert with his father, and is currently a professor at the Royal Conservatory in Brussels.