The musical talent of Yemelyan Katz (1919–1985) manifested itself early on. At the age of six, he already entered Pyotr Stolyarsky’s ten-year school for gifted children in Odessa and began to study the violin. Later, the musician enrolled in the Odessa Conservatory, but in 1939, he was forced to interrupt his studies after being drafted into the army.

Having participated in the Great Patriotic War, Yemelyan Katz went on to serve in the Far Eastern garrison for four more years and was discharged only in 1949 with the rank of captain. After that, his career path took an unexpected turn. On his way to the military academy in Moscow, Yemelyan Katz visited his relatives in Odessa and met his conservatory teacher Leonid Lembersky who convinced his former student to return to music.

In 1950, Yemelyan Katz became a student of the Chișinău Conservatory where he mastered a five-year course in just three years. In April 1954, the “Soviet Moldavia” newspaper already published a review of the recital of the talented graduate who had been able to “fully convey the ideas” of Johann Sebastian Bach in “Chaconne” and had performed “with great taste” a sonata by César Franck.

Yemelyan Katz was invited to work with the Odessa Symphony Orchestra. He also received offers from Yevgeny Mravinsky’s orchestra and other major musical ensembles. However, when he learned that a symphony orchestra was being formed in Barnaul, Katz knew that he wanted to go there.

Yemelyan Katz dedicated more than a quarter of a century to the region’s philharmonic in such capacities as a solo performer, orchestra musician, conductor, and concertmaster. He also participated in the activities of the People’s University of Culture. The musician toured across Siberia.

Yemelyan Katz proved himself as a talented teacher at the children’s music school and later at Barnaul Music College (specializing in chamber ensemble). One of Katz’s graduates, the organist Sergei Budkeyev, recalled that his teacher was “equally strict and fair. It was very difficult to touch his heart <…> When I once played one of Beethoven’s sonatas, Katz was moved to tears which made a lasting impression on me!”

The name of Yemelyan Katz, a musician, teacher, and honored worker of culture (since 1979) was given to the contest of the Altai Krai violinists and cellists, first held in 2001.