In 1910, after several years in England, a Russian professor of music named Michael Hambourg brought his family to Toronto. Although they did not exactly change Toronto society forever (their names are all but forgotten), the Hambourgs became significant players in Toronto’s cultural development. The Brothers Hambourg, by former CBC executive Eric Koch, details many fascinating moments in the city’s cultural history and the Hambourgs’ role therein.

Michael’s eldest son, Mark Hambourg, stayed behind in London, having established a career as a piano virtuoso and interpreter of Beethoven. Having performed at Massey Hall several times, Mark’s reputation paved the way for Michael to establish the Hambourg Conservatory in Toronto, in competition with the Toronto (later the Royal) Conservatory of Music. The second son, Jan, headed the violin department of the Hambourg Conservatory. Upon Michael’s death in 1916, the third son, Boris, took over as head of the Conservatory. Seven years later, Boris became the founding cellist of the Hart House String Quartet, which, thanks to Vincent Massey’s patronage, toured internationally to great acclaim over the next 22 years. At various times Mark, Jan, and Boris gave concerts and toured as The Hambourg Trio.

After the Second World War, Clement Hambourg, 16 years younger than Boris and the family’s black sheep, became an important figure on Toronto’s emerging jazz scene. He and his wife ran an after-hours bar in various locations throughout the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s. The House of Hambourg attracted many big names in modern jazz, as well as nurturing the talents of young Canadian jazz men like Moe Koffman and Ed Bickert.

The Brothers Hambourg is most valuable for its contribution to the Toronto cultural history canon. (And for Koch, a Jew, this naturally includes some useful discussions of the Establishment’s anti-Semitism and how it might have affected the family, who were at least nominally Jewish.)

Unfortunately, the book is structured as four separate biographies, so that the opening chapter, on Mark, who never lived in Toronto, is the weakest in this regard. Jan only lived in Toronto for 10 years, but his chapter makes entertaining reading for other reasons: an accomplished violinist, Bach scholar, and mentor to violinist Yehudi Menuhin, Jan was supported by his wife, the wealthy Isabelle McClung of Pittsburgh, who had lived with the novelist Willa Cather for 15 years. Like many other scholars, Koch speculates on whether Isabelle and Willa Cather were lovers.

There were also three Hambourg sisters, but apparently they were not encouraged to develop their talents, musical or otherwise; they are mentioned only in passing.