Victor Salvi

Victor Salvi (\ˈvik-tər\ \ˈsal-vē \); (March 4, 1920 – May 10, 2015) was an American-born harpist, harp maker, and entrepreneur. Salvi, who has been called "harpmaker of the world", was of Italian descent. Born in Chicago, Illinois, he immigrated back to Italy several years into his professional career. Credited for transforming the harp industry, he began his career as a musician, and turned to building harps.

As a musician, Victor Salvi played under some of the best known conductors of the twentieth century, including Dimitri Mitropoulos, Arturo Toscanini, and Bruno Walter. As a businessman, Salvi merged markets between his Europe-based Salvi Harps and the United States company Lyon & Healy, which he acquired in 1987. As an engineer, Salvi is responsible for the largest modern progressions of the instrument. Philanthropically, he has sponsored multiple competitions, concerts, as well as commissioning harp compositions. Salvi has expanded the harp's notoriety worldwide, raising the instrument's profile, and heightening its importance musically.

Victor Salvi was born into an Italian family and was the youngest child of Rodolfo Salvi and Apollonia Paoliello. Rodolfo was himself a musician and an instrument maker from Venice, who moved to the small Southern village of Viggiano, Basilicata, land of travelling musicians who brought their music and traditions all over the world, as well as known for the construction of harps.

Rodolfo married his second wife Apollonia, the granddaughter of Vincenzo Bellizia, a well known harp maker of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Rodolfo left Viggiano and brought the family to the United States in 1909, and once based in Chicago, Victor was born. Victor’s siblings were Livia, Aida, Giovanni, and his half-brother, Alberto, the oldest.

The Salvis were a musical family, and Alberto was a distinguished concert harpist in the 1920s. Victor’s older sister, Aida, was also an active musician in Chicago, including with the Civic Opera. Aida learned the instrument from Alberto, and Aida passed her knowledge on to Victor. Victor Salvi attended Marshall High School in Chicago. While there, he won a national harp competition and a scholarship to the Interlochen Center for the Arts.

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