He studied violin and viola at Budapest’s Franz Liszt Academy of Music. Also interested in conducting, in 1927 he formed his own chamber orchestra, which toured extensively in Central Europe before departing in 1934 for Asia.
Mixing concert and radio work, Pikler and his orchestra stayed in India for two years, later touring the East.
Pikler was directing the Netherlands East Indies Radio Orchestra in Jakarta in 1942, when the Japanese interned him. The extra food that h e received for performing helped him to survive but he later commented, "with all humility, I feel I was stronger than many others. I had a stronger will to survive."
After the war, in 1946, he arrived in Sydney, broke, without an instrument and wearing a borrowed suit.
Within months, he and another musician formed the Musica Viva Chamber Players. With Pikler as violinist and leader, they sometimes gave two hundred concerts a year. The group disbanded in 1951 following Musica Viva’s temporary collapse.
In 1952 he was offered the position of principal violist in the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. He reluctantly accepted because symphony work provided financial security. He was quickly recognized as the best viola player in Australia.
and became an Australian citizen in 1958.
In 1965 he left the Sydney Symphony Orchestra to become artistic director and violist with the Sydney String Quartet at the New South Wales State Conservatorium of Music.
In 1969 eye problems forced him to leave the quartet.
Returning to conducting, he formed the Robert Pikler Chamber Orchestra, which toured Australia and, in 1970, South-East Asia. He retired from public performances in the following year.
Throughout his career he was hampered by illness. Pressure neuritis in his left hand forced him to play with plastic caps on two fingers to lessen the pain. Terrible headaches were the legacy of cancer in the bone cavities of his face. At home, his poor health made him morose.
Besides music, Pikler was a talented bridge player and at the age of 17 he was officially rated a chess master. He participated in the Hungarian championship in 1931 (7th out of 15) and 1932 (finish unknown), Budapest International 1932 (10th out of 18). In Sydney 1957 in the Ukrainian Club’s Invitational he finished 5th-6th (out of 18) and the 1958/59 Australian Championship he tied for places 6-8 (out of 32); the event was a Swiss system tournament. In 1959 he played on 3rd board for New South Wales behind C.J.S. Purdy and Gregory Koshnitsky in a team match against Victoria, but lost his game.
Robert Pikler–Jeno Szekely1–0D02Hungarian Champioship, Budapest12Budapest1931Stockfish 15
QP Opening 1.d4 d5 2.f3 c6 3.bd2 f5 3...f6 4.c4 f5 5.h4 e6 6.b3 c7 7.e3 Equals. Kovacevic,V (2555) -Nikolic,P (2570) Pula 1984 4.e3 d7 4...e6 5.c4 d7 6.b3 b6 7.e2 e7 8.0-0 is completely even. Flohr,
S-Alekhine,A Hastings White Rock Pavilion 1934 5.h4 g6 6.xg6 hxg6 7.f3 More in line with white's opening is 7.e4 e6 8.d3 d6 9.d2 g5 For his
part back could have also advanced his e-Pawn here. 10.g3 He should not
have allowed ...g5 and so 10.g5 was preferred. g4 11.h4 The N has no
future here so 11.Ng1 was more accurate. gf6 12.e2 e4 A nice P sacrifice;
black has a strong initiative. 13.xg4 g5 14.g2 f5 Not bad, but 14...Qf3
was very strong. Black can hardly be blamed for missing this though because
the followup is hard to spot! 14...f6 15.e2 Watch this! 15.f1 xh2 16.f3 xd2 17.xd2 black is vastly superior. 15...xg3 16.fxg3 xg3 17.f2 xh1 18.xf6 xf6 19.h3 e4 20.0-0-0 hf2 and black is up the exchange
and a P. 15.h5+ f8 As will be seen it would have been better to play 15..
.Ke7 connecting the pieces on the back rank. 16.f3 xg3 But now this is
unsound! The prosaic 16...Ndf7 would have left his slightly better. 17.fxg3 xg3+ 18.e2 Without the Q on the f-file as in the previous variation black
has no effective followup. xh2 Pinning his own B. Black is now lost. Best
was 18...Bd6 but even then white's position would have been much better. 18...xh2 19.xh2 xh2 20.h1 d6 21.h8+ mates in 2. 19.g1 Excellent! g4 19...xg1 20.xh8+ e7 21.xd8 xd8 22.xg1 wins
easily. 20.xh2 gxf3+ 21.xf3 g8 Black's position has
totally collapsed and the rest of the game is played out of inertia. 22.h1 g5 23.f4 g4+ 24.f2 f6 25.g2 e4+ 26.e1 g3 27.h6+ e8 28.xe6+ d8 29.a5+ b6 30.d6+ e8 31.xc6+ f7 32.e6+ Black finally realized
the futility for playing on. 1–0
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