Bernard Zaslav (April 7, 1926 – December 28, 2016) was an American viola soloist and chamber musician with an extensive recording and performance career. A founding member of The Composers Quartet in 1965, he went on to play with the Fine Arts Quartet, Vermeer Quartet, and the Stanford String Quartet. He has also performed and recorded as the Zaslav Duo with his wife, pianist Naomi Zaslav. Early life and education Zaslav born in Brooklyn, New York and studied at the Juilliard School in 1946 as a violin student of Sascha Jacobsen and Mischa Mischakoff. Career Performing After further study on the viola with Lillian Fuchs in 1957 at the Yale Summer School of Music at Norfolk, Connecticut, Zaslav continued his career, performing (on viola) with the Cleveland Orchestra under George Szell for two years, subsequently returning to New York to work as a freelance musician Zaslav continued his career as violist of the Kohon String Quartet, the Composers String Quartet, the Fine Arts String Quartet, the Vermeer String Quartet, the Stanford String Quartet, and the viola/piano Zaslav Duo, together with his wife, Naomi Zaslav. In these ensembles he shared in commissioning, premiering, and recording new works by Elliott Carter, Milton Babbitt, Gunther Schuller, Ralph Shapey, Ruth Crawford Seeger, Roger Sessions, Ursula Mamlok, Henry Weinberg, Billy Jim Layton, Charles Wuorinen, Ben Johnston, Seymour Shifrin, Andrew Imbrie, Samuel Adler, John Downey, Karel Husa, Marc Neikrug, and William Bolcom. His discography comprises 131 works of chamber music and was released on the Vox, Turnabout, Laurel, Music & Arts, Nonesuch, Everest, Gasparo, CRI, Gallante, and Orfeo labels. The Kohon Quartet was awarded the Grand Prix du Disque for Chamber Music from the Académie Charles Cros for their recording of Alban Berg's String Quartet Op. 3 in 1964. Zaslav performed on a viola made by Giovanni Battista Guadagnini in 1781 in Turin, Italy, and is described as the "ex-Villa". It is one of only ten violas attributed to that maker. Teaching Zaslav has served on the faculties of Columbia University, New York University, Brooklyn College, the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, Northern Illinois University, and Stanford University. Writing Bernard Zaslav's memoir, The Viola in My Life: An Alto Rhapsody, was published in 2011 by Science and Behavior Books. The hardcover book includes 2 CDs compiled from his discography. Recording In 1993, Zaslav became a Resident Artist at the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA)