Myron Sandler; Violinist Taught the Young to Love Music

One hot summer day in 1958, the string quartet was practicing in the leader’s home, windows and doors open for the breeze. The musicians suddenly paused in mid-measure, aware of an increasing number of small noses pressed against the screens.

The preschoolers attached to the noses were invited in. They listened raptly and then exploded in what the leader later described as “naively intelligent” questions.

“Here,” said Myron K. Sandler, the college music professor, movie studio violinist and concert performer who loved nothing better than teaching children about music, “was the most appreciative, unspoiled audience we had ever had.”

Sandler, who taught for 33 years at Cal State Northridge, died Tuesday in Los Angeles. He was 78.

The impromptu incident with the youngsters more than four decades ago inspired Sandler to create his Chamber Music Workshop for Children. Within three years, it evolved into the Saturday Conservatory, a program of musical instruction and orchestra participation for preschoolers through high school students.

For more than 30 years, he also presented educational chamber music programs for students in the Glendale school system, and for many years was director of the Western Region of Young Audiences.

Sandler had no illusions that his thousands of Lilliputian pupils would become as adept at playing musical instruments as he, his college students, or those who studied violin and viola with him privately. He simply wanted to train future audiences to enjoy what he and other musicians could produce.

“Judging from the amount of poor music tolerated by most of the adult population today,” he told The Times in 1958, “good music probably never reached them as little children when their tastes and personalities were being developed.”

Eschewing dull, formal classes in music education, Sandler believed that a teacher must provide three things to make music palatable for youngsters: intimacy, proximity and informality. So he would introduce his musicians and their instruments, invite children to touch the violins and cellos and experiment with creating different sounds, then encourage them to ask whatever question came to mind.

And Sandler told stories. To illustrate musical dynamics, rhythm and harmony in Stravinsky’s Three Pieces for a String Quartet, he told children to imagine an awkward little bear learning how to dance.

“I’m afraid Stravinsky would have a fit if he could hear me,” the unabashed teacher told The Times.

He could also spin a story about a circus parade in a small town to introduce several pieces of classical music--from the church bells of a 15th century carillon, to a fanfare from Wagner’s “Meistersinger” to “March of the Clowns” by Perris.

Cognizant that young children have shorter attention spans than college students, Sandler limited sessions to 30 minutes and limited each classical music example to 90 seconds.

The professor cherished letters from young classical music converts thanking him for explaining what a violin bow was made of, or praising a piece by Mozart written when the composer was a kid himself. One special letter assured Sandler: “Your music was really better than something to eat.”

A solidly trained professional musician, Sandler began playing violin in his hometown of Milwaukee at age 7. He studied violin and viola with Arthur Letz and graduated from the Juilliard School of Music in New York.

He served in the Radio Production Unit of the Army Air Corps during World War II, and after the war settled in North Hollywood, where he spent more than a decade playing violin with the Columbia Pictures staff orchestra. He also freelanced with other movie studios and recording companies, and in the late 1940s worked with the Tascha Seidel String Quartet. In 1952, he formed the Mallory String Quartet, which performed in concerts broadcast over radio station KFAC.

Sandler earned a music education degree at UCLA and joined the faculty of the Northridge school then known as San Fernando Valley State College in 1958. He retired in 1991.

His wife of 49 years, violinist Marianne Sandler, died in 1992.

He is survived by two children, Michael and Mallory, and a brother, Lowell.

Services are scheduled for 1 p.m. Sunday at Mt. Sinai Mortuary.

The family has asked that any memorial donations be made to the music department at Cal State Northridge.