In good hands

As we celebrate legendary violinist Itzhak Perlman's 80th birthday, the virtuoso speaks to Charlotte Smith about teaching, conducting, his famous sound – and keeping inspired over a career of more than 60 years

- Charlotte Smith

Itzhak Perlman has just turned 80, but it's a milestone this warm and wonderful violin virtuoso is in no rush to acknowledge. 'Don't hurry me,' he jokes when I wish him an early Happy Birthday during our interview a few months before the big day on 31 August.

Yet it's an anniversary worth celebrating – and Warner Classics are only too happy to do so, with the release of an enormous 78-CD box set of Perlman's many mesmerising recordings made for EMI Classics, Teldec, Erato and Warner over a period of more than 40 years. A quick scan of the tracklist is enough to surmise that there's not a lot Perlman hasn't recorded – a vast repertoire encompassing everything from Vivaldi and Bach to Brahms and Tchaikovsky to contemporary compositions, klezmer and blues. The collaborators, too, have been numerous and starry – among them Martha Argerich, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Daniel Barenboim, Carlo Maria Giulini, Bernard Haitink, Yo-Yo Ma, Zubin Mehta, André Previn and Pinchas Zukerman. And throughout it all, Perlman's generosity and vibrancy have shone through that rich, bighearted sound.

Perhaps unsurprisingly for one of today's most recognisable violinists, Perlman has quite a lot to say about sound... or rather tone, which he distinguishes as personal. The first violinist he remembers hearing as a child was Jascha Heifetz, whom he regards as being 'in many ways the most recognisable fiddle player of all'.