Virtuoso violinist heard on a string of classic Hollywood movie scores
The American violinist Israel Baker, who has died aged 92, was renowned among his fellow musicians but unknown to most of the millions who heard him play on the soundtracks of such movies as Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 shocker Psycho, where he led Bernard Herrmann's screaming violin effects accompanying the stabbing of Janet Leigh in the shower scene.
Baker belonged to a select group of musicians who could fit into any situation at a moment's notice and read any piece on sight. But while making a lavish living in the Hollywood film and recording studios, he also had a considerable concert career.
He was born in Chicago, the youngest of four children of Russian immigrants. At six he appeared on national radio, and from his late teens he played in orchestras. At 22 he was concertmaster of Leopold Stokowski's All-American Youth Orchestra and later a member of Arturo Toscanini's NBC Symphony Orchestra. During the second world war, he served with the US army air force, stationed in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and continued playing the violin, entertaining wounded comrades. He met his first wife, Caroline, in New York, where she was raising funds for Russian war relief.
After the war, Baker became a highly paid session musician and gravitated to the west coast, where he was concertmaster of the Paramount Pictures studio orchestra, working with Herrmann and other composers including John Williams, John Barry, Franz Waxman, André Previn and Lalo Schifrin. His contributions were heard on the soundtracks of Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1973) and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984).
Although east coast musicians had the higher profile, California boasted superb string players such as Eudice Shapiro, Toscha Seidel and the members of the Hollywood String Quartet. Baker soon acquired a reputation second to none.
In the concert hall, his duo with the pianist Yaltah Menuhin was well known from 1950 onwards – they made a joint New York debut in 1951. Baker also led the crack Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and lesser bands such as the Orange County Pacific Symphony Orchestra. In the recording studio, he led the west coast version of the Columbia Symphony as well as classical and jazz ensembles for Capitol Records. He can be heard on discs by Frank Sinatra, Benny Carter, Mel Tormé, Sarah Vaughan, Johnny Mathis, Barbra Streisand and Nancy Wilson.
When the celebrated violinist Jascha Heifetz and the cellist Gregor Piatigorsky inaugurated their series of concerts in 1961, Baker was a natural choice to play second violin to Heifetz and to act as concertmaster when an orchestra was involved. The cellist Laurence Lesser remembers Baker as having "an astonishing spiccato near the point of the bow, just like Heifetz – whom he worshipped". And another cellist, Nathaniel Rosen, recalled: "No violinist could match phrases with the master like Izzy Baker."
Inadvertently, Baker was the innocent cause of a story circulated about Heifetz that suggested that Heifetz was so mean that he asked colleagues to bring their own lunch to a rehearsal. In truth, Heifetz had moved the rehearsal to clash with the lunch break to accommodate Baker (who had a studio date), and, as it was his cook's day off, he could not offer hospitality.
With such a fine temperament, Baker became known for being able to perform the most difficult music under pressure. His discography included Arnold Schoenberg's Fantasy (with Glenn Gould); six works by Igor Stravinsky, conducted by the composer; Alban Berg's Chamber Concerto; and sonatas by George Antheil, Vernon Duke and Erich Zeisl. With Heifetz and Piatigorsky, he recorded Mendelssohn's Octet, Brahms's G major Sextet and quintets by Dvorak, Franck, Mozart and Schubert. With his own quartet he recorded works by Giovanni Battista Viotti and as a concertmaster he played the solos for Erich Leinsdorf's 1957 LP of Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade.
His perfectionism never left him. The violinist Endre Granat, a friend and colleague for four decades, recalled: "I arrived at the studio for a recording session very early and moved to the farthest corner to work on my computer. Suddenly I heard the most pristine scales coming from the opposite end of the studio – four-octave scales, thirds and double harmonics. Israel was practising for about an hour. Later he told me he needed to warm up a little longer now that he had turned 85 years old."
Caroline died in 1974. Baker is survived by his second wife, Imelda, three daughters, Hilary, Merrill and Abby, and five grandchildren.
• Israel Baker, violinist, born 11 February 1919; died 25 December 2011