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I was born and raised in Nagoya, and started playing the violin when I was three and a half. I knew nothing else other than violin.
I was already telling my classmates at 8 and 9, that when I grew up, I wanted to perform all over the world. So they aren’t surprised at how I turned out at all.
In those days, western music—as well as Japanese—all came from Nagoya because of Shinichi Suzuki. His family made the Suzuki violins in Nagoya. Tokyo was just a big city.
Mr. Suzuki was much more gentle compared to my father.
My father was so strict.
He told me, “If you play the violin well, you can do other things well too.” And he was damn right.
I studied with this American teacher for three years in Tokyo, who became head of strings at Yale. Both him and his wife, a pianist, told me that I should go to America to study under him.
But when I got there at age 17, I found out that he had become an alcoholic, and the Japanese girl who went over before me had become his second wife. She wasn’t so friendly towards me.
They made me go to Yale music summer camp. So I went, and I was crying every night.
I bought Greyhound tickets twice, to escape to New York. But they found out and were all waiting for me at the bus stop.
Professor Aldo Parisot found out about my sordid living arrangements. He took me in, and introduced me to Joseph Fuchs at Julliard.
I wasn’t smiling when he told me that I got a full scholarship to Julliard because I didn’t know the meaning of the word “scholarship.”
And every year after that, I got scholarships.
I didn’t need any money either because I started playing concerts. Which meant that I couldn’t make it to all of my classes.
I had toured all over the US, Canada, and Mexico, so I thought I should conquer the other side of the world, Europe. I went back to Tokyo and found a manager.
My manager asked if I wanted to go to Hong Kong. I asked, “Where is Hong Kong?”
That was 1974, the year the Hong Kong Philharmonic became a professional orchestra. And my husband now, Klaus Heymann, a founding father, was looking for soloists. I knew nothing about him back then.
I arrived at Kai Tak. He had arranged for musicians to stay at the Mandarin.
He called and asked me out for dinner. I said I had room service already. He asked me out for drinks. I said sorry, I don’t drink. He asked me out for tea at Furama. I had to say yes.
We started talking about music. Wow. I’ve never met anybody who knew so much.
We married right away, and it’s been 36 years.
“You play, I sell,” he always told me.
When my son was 15, he came back home from school and told me: “Mom, I don’t want to play the violin anymore. Some guys at school said it’s a sissy instrument.” So I didn’t force him. I don’t want him to be a violinist anyway. One in the family is enough.
Why am I still teaching? I want a better player to come out from Hong Kong. But it takes time to cultivate.
“OK is not enough.” That’s what my father would say. Oh my students are all afraid of me, but they all love me, because they know that I teach from the heart.
Hong Kong people have no manners. Nowadays even the Japanese have no manners. I teach manners to my students as well as the violin.
I teach some of the mothers common sense too.
My husband thinks I’m crazy because I’m teaching five autistic children, some with Down Syndrome as well.
The government doesn’t do anything about piracy.
The first and second pirated copies of my albums, that’s flattery. But more than a 100? Come on.


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Violinist Takako Nishizaki

Magazines

Takako Nishizaki is one of the most frequently recorded and best-selling violinists of all time. She sits down and chats with Johannes Pong over cake and coffee at her home on Kadoorie Hill.
