FINDING FULFILLMENT IN A FIDDLE

His name is Eliot Chapo. One look at him and you know he’s an artist -an odd cross between Luciano Pav-arotti and Woody Allen. One earful of his music, and you know he was born to be a violinist.

For those who haven’t yet heard Chapo’s music, don’t fret; he happens to be the first-chair violinist for the Dallas Symphony Orchestra (DSO). He’s been with the orchestra since 1976 and is now one of the hottest names in Dallas music circles.

At 37, Chapo has climbed to a point in his career many young musicians hope to reach when they’re twice his age.

When Chapo was 15, he left his native Florida and enrolled in the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied under Efrem Zim-balist and Oscar Schumsky.

When Chapo turned 21, he graduated from the institute and immediately became eligible for the draft for the Vietnam War. His main concern was to avoid the war, and his violin was his ticket out. He joined the Marine Corps Band’s small orchestra, which played for private White House parties. He played for four years under presidents Johnson and Nixon, playing free-lance with the Philadelphia Orchestra whenever possible. His first civilian job was with the Los Angeles Philharmonic; he stayed there one year. He then became an associate concertmaster with William Steinberg in Pittsburgh for two years until he joined the New York Philharmonic and later became its concert-master.

Chapo went far -fast. It might have been the fast pace that made the DSO offer so inviting. He met his wife, Sue (a Dallasite who was working in New York then), married and moved to Dallas.

Besides spending approximately 20 hours per week working with the symphony, Chapo is also on staff at SMU, where he teaches violin. He also gives private lessons in his home. His 15-month-old son, Justin, should be ready to play violin in a few years, and Chapo hopes to teach him to play with the same quarter-sized violin with which he learned.