Born to a Jewish family in Vilnius, Lithuania, he later moved to the United States as a member of the Budapest String Quartet.

[1] At this time, the Budapest String Quartet, whose cellist was Sasha's brother Mischa, lost their first violinist.

[1] In 1934, the Nazis made threats to the quartet and they left Berlin for Paris the next day, never to return to Germany again – even on tour.

[1] Later on, Schneider felt the need to develop himself as an independent musician, so he left the quartet in 1944, full of energy and ideas.

He toured with Ralph Kirkpatrick and he formed the Albeneri Trio with Benar Heifetz and Erich Itor Kahn.

They had tried two other second violinists (Ortenberg and Gorodetzky), neither of them able to reach Schneider's high standards, and Roismann had refused to continue with anyone else.

[4] The musicians, in their teens and early 20s, are selected by audition, and those accepted pay no fee to take part in a intensive 10-day regimen of rehearsals, coaching sessions, workshops, and performances which culminates in an annual Christmas Eve concert at Carnegie Hall.

[5][6] During the time Schneider also joined forces as the conductor of the Columbia Symphony Orchestra with the legendary Rudolf Serkin to record Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Piano Concerto No.

[8] In 1975, he accompanied pianist Arthur Rubinstein in Beethoven's Emperor Concerto with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra in Israel.