| Biography | Just 16 when war broke out, she was already an experienced performer, and gave recitals for the armed services in factories and at Dame Myra Hess's National Gallery series. She was a serious interpreter - notably of Beethoven and Chopin - with a striking stage presence.
Shafir was born in Odessa; her mother was a a dressmaker, her father a Yiddish poet and journalist. She was two when her father died, after which she and her mother moved to Palestine to join the Russian-Jewish emigré circle of Tel Aviv. Shafir was attracted to the piano, and attempts by her mother to steer her towards the violin were determinedly resisted. She studied the keyboard from the age of eight, and gave her first public performance at 11.
In 1935, the family moved to London, where she became a pupil of George Woodhouse and the piano virtuoso Solomon, who became a lifelong friend; she acknowledged the influence that he and Artur Schnabel had on her work.
Shafir went to Schnabel's summer school at his Lake Comovilla, where students were expected to perfect complex works rapidly. The discipline there, and her intense commitment, resulted in a remarkable ability to bring compositions to concert performance level in days.
In 1936, she made her English concerto debut, and first appeared at the Royal Albert Hall in 1941. Her delicate build belied a physical and technical power which she attributed to her studies with Schnabel. To the general concerto repertoire of Schumann, Grieg and Tchaikovsky, Shafir added Brahms's second piano concerto, then regarded as too heavyweight for the average woman performer.
She was particularly associated with Sir Arthur Bliss's Piano Concerto in B flat, composed in 1938 for the New York World's Fair and premiered by Solomon. It was Shafir who performed the work, conducted by the composer, at a November 1944 Albert Hall thanksgiving event, with addresses by Winston Churchill and the American ambassador.
During the 1940s and 50s, she appeared throughout England and at the main London concert halls under the batons of conductors such as Sir Adrian Boult, Sir John Barbirolli and Anatole Fistoulari; she also formed a close professional association with George Weldon.
Proms performances included a Last Night in 1957, playing Liszt's Hungarian Fantasia and sharing the platform with Constance Shacklock, Basil Cameron and Sir Malcolm Sargent. She made radio and television broadcasts, but declined to record commercially, believing that the studio was no substitute for the concert hall.
In 1958, Shafir married the solicitor Mark Romney; a brief first marriage had ended in divorce. The demands of her career inevitably conflicted with a desire to be with her family, and in the mid-1960s she retired from the concert platform and turned to teaching.
With characteristic intellectual energy, she then studied for a Russian degree at University College London. She translated both Hebrew and Russian texts, and was a consultant to Arthur Koestler on his book The Thirteenth Tribe.
Shafir's talents, and fiercely focused energy, were offset by a gentleness and self- effacement that encouraged her to minimise her achievements, while making her riveting company. The ill health, in particular Parkinson's disease, which dogged her final years did little to dim her wit or spirits.
Shulamith Shafir, pianist, born May 1 1923; died November 25 2000 |