His performances at that time were primarily limited to salon-style recitals and the more overtly virtuosic repertoire; however, after making the acquaintance of pianist Ferruccio Busoni, he began to develop a much more thoughtful and intellectual approach to music that eventually earned him the nickname "The Scholarly Virtuoso".

After a brief stint with an inadequate teacher, Szigeti auditioned at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music and was admitted directly into the class of Jenő Hubay, without the usual delays and formalities.

[5] Szigeti joined such violinists as Franz von Vecsey, Emil Telmányi, Jelly d'Arányi and Stefi Geyer in Hubay's studio.

[6] In those days, Europe produced a great many child prodigies, inspired by the phenomenal success of the young Czech virtuoso Jan Kubelík and formed by rigorous teaching and enthusiastic parents.

The Hubay studio was no exception; Szigeti and his fellow wunderkinder performed extensively in special recitals and salon concerts during their study at the Liszt Academy.

Despite the formidable program, the event received mention only by a photograph in the Sunday supplement of the Berliner Tageblatt captioned: "A Musical Prodigy: Josef Szigeti".

[8][7] Szigeti spent the next few months with a summer theater company in a small Hungarian resort town, playing mini-recitals in between acts of folk operetta.

Midway through the tour, in Surrey, he met a music-loving couple who effectively adopted him, extending an invitation to stay with them for an indefinite length of time.

Also during this time, Szigeti toured with an all-star ensemble including legendary singer Dame Nellie Melba and pianists Ferruccio Busoni and Wilhelm Backhaus.

In Naples, Italy, in November 1956, just after the Soviets crushed the Hungarian uprising, as soon as he walked onto the stage the audience burst into wild applause and shouts of Viva l’Ungheria!

Szigeti recalls in his memoirs the words of Consul General Baron de Montlong at the critical moment: Let us not, if we can avoid it, fall victim to the dead letter of the law.

Szigeti writes: "... the impossibility of communicating by phone or wire with my wife--whose condition I pictured with the somewhat lurid pessimism usual to young prospective fathers--was certainly a greater torment to me than all the other discomforts put together".

By 1940, the outbreak of World War II forced the Szigetis to leave Europe for the United States, while Irene remained in Switzerland, having married pianist Nikita Magaloff (1912-1992) earlier that year.

In a letter to a friend, Szigeti describes their California life: Wanda is happy, doing wonders with her gardening, chicken and rabbit raising, preserve and pâté de foie making.

[37]Szigeti narrowly escaped being killed in the plane crash that claimed the life of movie star Carole Lombard in January 1942.

Szigeti, who was on his way to Los Angeles for a concert, was forced to give up his seat on TWA Flight 3 at a refueling stop in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to allow the plane to take on 15 soldiers who, it being wartime, had priority.

The plane, off course at night and with wartime blackout conditions in effect, crashed into a mountain cliff after takeoff from an intermediate stop in Las Vegas, killing everyone on board.

[41] This comment illustrates well the general nature of Szigeti's reception by both critics and fellow musicians: while his musical insights, intellect, and depth of interpretation were almost universally lauded, the purely technical aspect of his playing was awarded a more mixed reaction.

A 1926 recital review in The New York Times, for example, laments that ... his performance was stiff and dry in its observance of letter and its absence of spirit ... Mr. Szigeti was not only inclined to dryness of tone and angularity of phrase, but there were also passages of poor intonation.

[42] In contrast, a review from the previous year in the same journal remarked after a performance of the Beethoven concerto that Mr. Szigeti has a rather small but beautiful tone, elegance, finish.

He played with a quiet sincerity which grew upon the audience, though not with the virility and sweep that other violinists find ... it is clear that Mr. Szigeti is a player to command esteem and respect for his musicianship, for the genuineness of his interpretations, and his artistic style.

[44] In his memoirs, published in 2004, cellist János Starker asserts that Szigeti was one of the giants among the violinists I had heard from childhood on, and my admiration for him is undiminished up to this day.

Curiously for a Hungarian, from whom one expects wild, energetic, spontaneous qualities, Szigeti travelled even farther up a one-way road of deliberate intellectualism.

A young accompanist who worked with Szigeti told me that two hours concentration wouldn't get them beyond the first three bars of a sonata--so much analysis and ratiocination went into his practice ... A similar persnicketiness marked his adjudication.

The New York Times reviewed it favorably: although in their description the book was "constructed along utterly anarchistic lines, with each episode and anecdote left pretty much on its own",[48] they asserted that "It also has the flavor of life in it, and it is marked by an exhilarating revolt against the custom of arranging catastrophes and triumphs under neat chapter headings".

Szigeti was dismayed by this trend, especially since he considered the fast-paced and intense preparation necessary for high-level competitions to be "…incompatible with the slow maturing either of the performing artist or of the repertoire.

"[49] Szigeti believed that such accelerated development of a musician led to performances that "lack(ed) the stamp of authenticity, the mark of a personal view evolved through trial and error.

"[52] Other topics prominently discussed include the most effective position of a violinist's left hand, the violin works of Béla Bartók, a cautionary list of widely accepted misprints and editorial inaccuracies in the standard repertoire, and most notably, the vital importance of J.S.

In 1938, Szigeti and clarinetist Benny Goodman teamed up to commission a trio from Bartók: originally intended to be a short work just long enough to fill both sides of a 78 rpm record, the piece soon expanded beyond its modest intent and became the three-movement Contrasts for piano, violin and clarinet.

[citation needed] As well as performing new works dedicated to him, Szigeti also championed the music of other contemporary composers, notably Sergei Prokofiev and Igor Stravinsky.