István Ruha plays Sarasate-Zigeunerweisen

István Ruha (Stefan Ruha)
was born in 1931 in Nagykároly(Carei) in the Transylvanian Romania in a Hungarian origin family.
He dedicated himself to violin playing from his early childhood,continuing to study it at the High School of Music and finally,the Gheorghe Dima Conservatoire in Cluj-Napoca(Klausenburg) under the guidance of Prof. Ferenc Balogh a pupil of Jenő Hubay.
His subsequent evolution has been quite rapid.
Shortly,István Ruha succeeded to gradually surpass all the violinists of his generation, puzzling the specialty critics and conquering the enthusiastic audiences.Three foremost international contest sanctioned him definitely among the farfames interpretes,granting him top rewards:

-THIRD PRIZE
at the P.I.Tchaikowsky Competition in Moscow
-FIRST PRIZE
at the George Enescu Competition in Bucharest
-SECOND GRAND PRIZE
at the Jaques Thibaud Competition in Paris

These awards opened him the gates towards a rich and intensive violin concert career.He has worked with internationally acclaimed conductors, such as Kirill Kondrashin,Sir John Barbirolli,Carlo Zecchi,Franz Konwitschny,Yevgeny Mravinsky,Anatoli Fistulari,Kurt Masur,Lorin Maazel,Kobayashi Ken-Ichiro,Antonin Ciolan,Iván Fischer and János Ferencsik.
All the fourteen Philharmonics in Romania continually welcome him as a guest-soloist in their concerts,while his tours abroad take place successively,adding each time new laurels to his artistic honours.Beside this,István Ruha also appeared as first violin of the NAPOCA String Quartet wich he created in 1964,succeeding to push them up among the best chamber groups of Romania,and as soloist of Pfilharmonic's Chamber Orchestra in Cluj-Napoca.Moreover,he was a pedagogue as well,mastered the class of violin at the Gheorghe Dima Conservatoire.

As a token of appreciation for his outstanding artistic merits,the Romanian and Hungarian Government granted István Ruha the medal and high title of Merited Artist as well as several other Prizes,Orders,and Distinctions.