New Guinness Record for fastest violinist

Violinist Ben Lee has broken the Guinness World Record for the Fastest Violin Player, playing over 13 notes per second. Lee broke the record with a performance of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Flight of the Bumblebee.

The previous record holder was violinist David Garrett, who took 1 minute 5.26 seconds to perform the same piece, just over a second more than Lee, who took 1 minute 4.21 seconds.

With its great technical demands, Flight of the Bumblebee is deemed a good piece with which to judge the Guinness World Record for the fastest violin player. Lee’s performance was judged by Guinness World Record officials and musicians from the London and New York Philharmonic Orchestras.

Ben Lee is one half of the electric violin duo, FUSE, but on this occasion he swapped his electric violin for the acoustic violin.

Last December Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli and 14,000 Londoners broke the world record for the greatest number of people simultaneously singing a Christmas carol, at the World Premiere of Disney's 'A Christmas Carol'.