Robert McDuffie performs in the Music Room (Photo by James Brantley)

We were lucky enough to have the American virtuoso violinist Robert McDuffie open the 2010-11 Sunday Concerts season.  Accompanying McDuffie were students and colleagues from the Robert McDuffie Center for Strings at Mercer University.

During the Coda Session with Music Director Caroline Mousset, McDuffie showed his Southern gentlemanly wit.  Click below to listen to his account of his initial meeting with James Williams, former chairman of SunTrust Bank, to get investors to help him purchase his extraordinary violin, a Joseph Guarnerius del Gesu from 1735.

The final piece on the concert program gave a glimpse of Violin Concerto No. 2 “The American Four Seasons” with a clever transition into Violin Concerto No. 1, both composed for Robert McDuffie by Baltimore’s Philip Glass. Click here to listen to McDuffie performing the Glass compositions.