Trivia

Father of Claus Asmussen.

He was a swing violin player and showman who spent eight decades accompanying some of the world's leading jazz musicians, including Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Lionel Hampton and Fats Waller. He also played flute and vibraphone.

He made an appearance at the 1967 Monterey Jazz Festival, which included a celebrated violin summit with him, Ray Nance and Jean-Luc Ponty.

He played publicly until 2010 when he had a blood clot, his career having spanned eight decades.

In the late 1950s, Asmussen formed the trio Swe-Danes with singer Alice Babs and guitarist Ulrik Neumann. The group became quite successful in Scandinavia for their music hall style entertainment and also toured the United States.

Asmussen was invited by Ellington to play on his Jazz Violin Session recording in 1963 with Stéphane Grappelli and Ray Nance.

Asmussen's collection of jazz music, photographs, posters and other material is held in the jazz collections at the University Library of Southern Denmark.

In 1966, Asmussen appeared alongside Grappelli, Stuff Smith, and Jean-Luc Ponty in a jazz Violin Summit in Switzerland that was issued as a live recording.

Asmussen played with Valdemar Eiberg and Kjeld Bonfils during World War II, during which time jazz had moved to the underground and served as a form of political protest.

In 1969, he guested on Snakes in a Hole, an album by the jazz-rock band Made in Sweden.

He started working professionally as a violinist, vibraphonist, and singer at age 17, leaving his formal training behind for good.

He played with the Mills Brothers and Fats Waller in the 1930s when they passed through Denmark, but when Benny Goodman tried to get him in the mid-'50s for his small group, strict immigration laws made it impossible for him to work in the U.S.

Asmussen's son, Claus Asmussen, is a guitar player in Denmark and a former member of the band Shu-Bi-Dua.

Aged 16 he first heard recordings by jazz violinist Joe Venuti and began to emulate his style.

Always based in Scandinavia (hence his obscurity in the U.S.), Asmussen made his first records as a leader in 1935 and was consistently popular in his homeland for decades thereafter.

Asmussen later was greatly influenced by Stuff Smith, whom he met in Denmark.

He was a Danish jazz violinist, known as "The Fiddling Viking".

He was still active playing violin at the age of 94.

Asmussen was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, was raised in a musical family, and started taking violin lessons at the age of seven.

Early in his career he worked in Denmark and on cruise ships, with artists such as Josephine Baker and Fats Waller.