Leonid Hambro, pianist, straight man, 1920-2006

Leonid Hambro (left) and Victor Borge

Pianist Leonid Hambro died on Monday at 83. Mr. Hambro had an illustrious career as a concert pianist, making over 100 recordings and performing with the likes of Fritz Kreisler, Jascha Heifetz, and Isaac Stern and was conducted by Arturo Toscanini, Dmitri Mitropoulos, Leonard Bernstein, and Eugene Ormandy, among others. He was known for an astounding musical memory and great skill at improvising. So it's arguably both ironic and charming, that he was best known for a roughly ten-year stint playing the straight man to pianist/comedian Victor Borge. He left Borge in 1970 to join the faculty of Cal Arts.

He never stopped doing serious concert work, but he also proved himself worthy of his time with Mr. Borge. Consider this excerpt from a New York Times review of a 1992 recital by Mr. Hambro:

"When a pair of latecomers took their seats after the second piece, he asked, "Where are you from?" When they said New York, Mr. Hambro said: "Isn't that funny? I'm from Los Angeles and I got here before you did."

And here's an anecdote about Victor Borge in Hambro's own words:

"'We came to a place where I played on three pianos, his piano, and my piano for the two-piano work, and then an offstage piano. And then one day we came to a place where my piano on the stage was very old, and the keys were very yellow, it was so old. So he had the microphone -- the audience could never hear me -- and I turned to him and I pointed to my keys, and I said, "My elephant smoked too much.'

He thought that was very funny, and he said, 'Can any of you in the balcony see Mr. Hambro's keys? Mr. Hambro just told me that his elephant smoked too much.' So he was willing to give credit."

Here's the rest of the conversation:
A Conversation with Leonid Hambro from Annals of Improbable Research

Mr. Hambro made three appearances on the Celebrity Series with Victor Borge that I can verify, but he likely made more (if we were lucky).

New York Times obituary

Washington Post obituary

Sheetmusicplus.com link to Mr. Hambro's composition Happy Birthday Dear Ludwig

Newsletter of NYC Atheists with item on Mr. Hambro entertaining the group at a dinner and his membership (pdf)