Anthony Fusco

I am a violinist who played professionally for over 40 years. I studied in Europe with one of the great violinists of our time, Tibor Varga .

Violinist Anthony Fusco was born in Miami, Florida, where he began his musical studies at the age of nine under the tutelage of some of the finest professional virtuosi in south Florida. Anthony made remarkable progress, and by the time he was in high school he had become concertmaster of the All Miami Youth Symphony, performing such works as the Saint-Saëns Violin Concerto No. 3 in B Minor, Op. 61, for television audiences.

After successfully auditioning for the Manhattan School of Music, he decided to pursue further training in Germany with the internationally renowned soloist Tibor Varga at the Nordwestdeutsche Musikakademie in Detmold. While in Europe, Anthony also was honored to study with violin virtuoso Lukas David. Anthony was a member of the Kammerorchester Tibor Varga, internationally acclaimed for its excellent recordings, and performed at the Festival Tibor Varga in Sion, Switzerland.

Upon returning to the United States, he became a tenured player with the Miami Philharmonic Orchestra under the direction of such esteemed conductors as Sixten Ehrling, Alain Lombard, Brian Priestman, and Stanislaw Skrowachewski. A founding member of the Miami Chamber Symphony, he played frequently with other professional ensembles. In addition to his primary work as a classical musician, he has performed, toured, or recorded with some of the most widely recognized names in popular music, among them, the Bee Gees, Seals and Croft, and Whitney Houston. Anthony's last post before his recent retirement was as first violinist with the Florida Orchestra, in which capacity he served for twenty-three years under the batons of such distinguished conductors as Jahja Ling and Stefan Sanderling.

He now resides in Knoxville Tennessee.

I studied in Germany with Tibor Varga and was a member of the Kammerorchester Tibor Varga. I also studied violin with Lucas David at
the Northwest German Music Academy in Detmold. I am a retired member of
The Florida Orchestra (Tampa), a major orchestra which is a member of ICSOM. I played in
the first violin section there for twenty-three years, and also
performed in other orchestras, including ten years with the Florida Philharmonic in Miami under the direction of Alain Lombard and other
leading conductors.

I have been a member of the American String teachers Assoc. and Chamber Music America

I Am an opponent of the Suzuki method.
To start with, Suzuki's method does not teach reading printed music.
I would like to include here some blogs that I found from others on a violin site about problems concerning Suzuki .

From Johns T
Posted on July 11, 2009 at 7:10 AM

Having studied with the Suzuki myself for around six years until I stopped, I must say that my sight-reading was pretty terrible (non-existant terrible). But with slow practice and LOTS of orchestra and ensemble practice, my I am proud to say that my sight-reading has improved tremendously! So my advice for those who want to strengthen their sight-reading skill is to join an orchestra or play in an ensemble! :)

From A . Franklin
Posted on July 11, 2009 at 12:06 PM

I practice sightreading every day, even if it means just reading through a page or two way under tempo. The various CD-ROMS and IMSLP has made this really fun.

The experience I've had teaching is that the transfer students that started out in a Suzuki rote program have less fluency reading music than students that start with a traditional reading method. And the longer that note reading is put off, the harder it is for the student to gain fluency. Maybe brain wiring?

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