Eudice Shapiro To read it in full, click here to subscribe and login. Once upon a time there were two violinists called Shapiro. Close in age, they were not related but were aware of each other and expressed mutual admiration of the other’s artistry. Their lives shed an interesting light on what it was like to be a female string player in America in the 20th century. Eudice Shapiro was the elder, born on 7 August 1914 in Buffalo, New York, into a musical clan. ‘My father, a violin teacher, was born in Buffalo,’ she told me. ‘My mother, a pianist, was three months old when she came to the US for my grandfather to take on the duties of cantor at a synagogue in Buffalo. They came from Riga, Latvia.