Regarded as one of the world's greatest cello players, Pablo Casals was inspired by the music of Bach and Beethoven to become a master virtuoso and had a long, extraordinary career bookended by recitals for Queen Victoria when he was 23 and a performance at the White House for President John F. Kennedy at 85.

Born in the small wine making coastal town of El Vendrell in Spain, his strict father was a choir leader at the local parish and taught Casals piano and violin as a child, but he fell in love with the cello after hearing a travelling string quartet. He studied at the Escola Municipal de Musica in Barcelona and, by chance, discovered the sheet music of Bach's six cello suites in a music store. He spent the next 13 years practising daily before becoming the first person to play the compositions in full in concert and later - between 1936 and 1939 - he made landmark recordings of the pieces. The support of the Queen Regent Maria Cristina propelled him to play for Queen Victoria at Osborne House in 1899 and he was soon touring the world, recording for the Columbia label in 1915, playing with his trio and conducting his own orchestra.

As a proud Republican and supporter of independence for his native Catalonia, his politics became more prominent during the Spanish Civil War and he left to live in France and refused to play in any country which recognised the Franco regime. He later moved to Puerto Rico and founded their National Symphony Orchestra in 1958 and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by John F. Kennedy in 1961, before his death in 1973 from a heart attack. He was posthumously given a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1989 and is recognised as mastering and revolutionising cello playing and its place in classical music.

Pablo Casals

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