Isaac Mamott

Isaac Mamott. Cellist, teacher, b Lutzk, Ukraine, 25 Apr 1907, naturalized Canadian 1934, d Toronto 5 Apr 1964. Taken to Winnipeg at six, he had lessons there in violin and piano and at 10 began to study the cello with Dezsö Mahalek. He made his radio debut in 1922. After playing for a time in a quartet with the violinists Joseph Shadwick and John Sutter and the violist Eugene Hudson, he founded the Tudor String Quartet (Eugene Hudson, then Valberg Leland and Joseph Sera, violins, Michael Barten, viola), which was heard for 10 years on CBC Winnipeg. He also had a solo program on radio. In 1940 he moved to Toronto, where he played 1941-3 and was principal cello 1943-50 with the TSO and was co-founder and a member 1943-58 of the Parlow String Quartet (although a heart condition prevented his full participation in the later years). He also served 1952-64 as principal cello of the CBC Symphony Orchestra and was a member (with Albert Pratz and Glenn Gould) of the Festival Trio, which performed at the first (1953) Stratford Festival, and of the Festival Orchestra there. He was a member of Heinz Unger's York Concert Society Orchestra. He gave the premiere, 15 Oct 1950, of John Weinzweig's sonata Israel with Leo Barkin at the piano.

Mamott taught in Winnipeg and 1942-64 at the RCMT; his pupils included William Findlay (TS), James Hunter (Vancouver Symphony Orchestra), Ronald Laurie (TS), and Rowland Pack. Mamott died of a heart attack during the final bars of a performance with the CBC SO of Richard Strauss' Also sprach Zarathustra, in which he had played several solos.