January 20 , 1891 in Talnoye , a small village in the province of Kiev . He had been born into the materially impoverished but intensely spiritual world of Eastern European Jewry , where in the words of the eminent theologian Abraham Joshua Heschel " the stomachs were empty , the homes barren , but the minds were crammed with the riches of Torah " . Elman's grandfather Josef was a klezmer , a folk musician , who played the violin and was also famous for the beauty of his tone . Indeed , people who heard both the grandfather and his famous grandson claimed that Mischa "inherited" his tone from Josef . Mischa's father Saul was a melamed ( a teacher of Hebrew ) and a merchant . Elman's perfect pitch manifested itself very early , but his father was initially apprehensive over Mischa's interest in music , since a musician traditionally occupied a low position in the social structure of the Jewish community . But Saul ultimately gave in and presented his son with a miniature violin . Within a few weeks , unaided by anyone , Mischa mastered several simple tunes . The wunderkind soon became something of a local celebrity , the rumors of his gifts finally reaching the local landowner , Countess Urassova . She listened to Mischa play and made his father an offer - to buy the child from his family , provide for his education and raise him as a Christian.
The extraordinary number of distinguished musicians born or raised in Odessa is one of the true wonders in the history of music . From that cosmopolitan city on the coast of the Black See came , among others , David Oistrakh , Nathan Milstein, Emil Gilels , Benno Moiseiwitsch , Simon Barere , Sviatoslav Richter and Tossy Spivakovsky.
In Odessa Mischa began to work with a local teacher by the name of Alexander Fidelmann and soon was admitted to the Imperial Academy of Music . The boy progressed quickly and was frequently invited to play for visiting violin luminaries - Adolph Brodsky , Pablo de Sarasate and Leopold Auer . Sarasate wrote a letter of recommendation for Elman in which he stated that Mischa was " a possessor of great talent. If he succeeds in taking up his musical studies in either Paris , Berlin or St Petersburg he will within a few years be the pride of Europe ". Finally , after an audition with Auer in 1902 , Mischa Elman was admitted to the St Petersburg Conservatory .