The violinist Emanuel Hurwitz, who has died aged 87, was one of Britain's leading chamber musicians. Few string players carved a career without either overlapping or bumping into Hurwitz, either as a player in his various ensembles or as a highly influential teacher, and he became one of the most respected violinists of the half century following the second world war.

Always immersed in chamber music, for which he had an empathy both in playing and teaching, there is no doubt that had he practised with a soloist's career in mind, he could have been one of the foremost violinists of his time. But this was not his chosen way, and he liked a quiet life with his colleagues, his natural musicianship helped by a terrific technique and an effortless understanding of style.

It was as a leader that Hurwitz found his playing and personal strengths most happily employed, his quiet tact and good humour always calming any troubled waters. Never one for losing his temper or throwing his weight about, and invariably friendly to those around him, he would always see the funny side of some impossible situation - often involving the notorious egos of conductors and soloists - and was able to dig his fellow musicians out of whatever hole they were in, often with large lashings of his incredible humour.

He was held in such respect that his tactics rarely failed. These outstanding leadership qualities were combined with the strengths of his fiddle playing, not least of which was the most gorgeous sound he created on his treasured 1603 Amati instrument.

Born in Aldgate, east London, with both parents of Russian-Jewish ancestry, Hurwitz was given a violin outfit for his fifth birthday, and had lessons first with a local teacher, Hilda Morris, going on after two years to Leon Bergman, whose pupils included the fine violinist Albert Sandler. In Riki Gerardy's absorbing book, Talks With Emanuel Hurwitz: 82 Years With the Violin, Hurwitz referred to a supportive family background, his father phlegmatic but his mother unpredictable, becoming hysterical if she thought he had not done enough practice. "She would curl up a plait in each hand and bang her head against the wall a few times, screaming that I was the son of the devil, before collapsing into a chair and sighing 'Oi veh!'."

Hurwitz was always a natural player and found the instrument relatively easy, certainly in comparison to school work, taking up a scholarship from a friend of Bronislaw Huberman at 14 to the Royal Academy of Music, where his studies included learning with the Australian Sydney Robjohns. This was his first introduction to the central-European, Viennese-Hungarian way of playing, as Robjohns had attended classes with the Joachim Quartet, whose leader, Joseph Joachim, had been close to Brahms and Dvorak.

The second world war interrupted Hurwitz's career with a spell in the Royal Army Medical Corps. He joined the band, based at the headquarters in Fleet, Hampshire. In 1943 he was bound for the Middle East, playing in any place recently occupied by the British, and returned to London in 1944 to spend the last few months of his service playing in a group called Stars in Battledress, which was filled with musicians such as William Pleeth and Frederick Riddle.

After the war, Hurwitz found himself playing quartets, his early chamber colleagues in the Hurwitz String Quartet (1946-51) also becoming members of the English Chamber Orchestra (ECO) when it was founded in 1948 (initially, it was known as the Goldsborough Orchestra). Hurwitz became leader of the ECO and held the position for 20 years, presiding over a group in which the string playing was without peer.

He also led the Melos Ensemble (1956-72), then one of the most stylish of such groups in Europe, and many famous recordings were made, including the Beethoven Septet, the Schubert and Mendelssohn Octets, and Schubert's Trout Quintet. The Melos collaborated on many occasions with Benjamin Britten, as in the celebrated 1963 recording of the War Requiem with the London Symphony Orchestra; Britten also regularly consulted Hurwitz about technical aspects of the fiddle parts in his writing (and he conducted Hurwitz and the ECO in the recording of Bach's six Brandenburg Concertos for Decca).

In 1969, Hurwitz became leader of the New Philharmonia Orchestra. Never having led a symphony orchestra, he was curious to see what it would be like to lead 100 people instead of 25 - and what it would be like leading for Otto Klemperer at the age of 80. Then, in 1970, he joined the Aeolian String Quartet as leader, encouraged by his old friend Raymond Keenlyside, whom he had known since the Goldsborough days, to take over the first chair from Sydney Humphreys. This was the quartet's last incarnation, with Keenlyside (second violin), Margaret Major (viola) and Derek Simpson (cello): it lasted until the group disbanded in 1981.

In particular, the quartet will be remembered for its recording of the complete Haydn string quartets (the project was the main incentive for Hurwitz to join the group), an undertaking completed in 1976, since when it has reappeared on CD, over 22 discs. In 1975, they performed the late Beethoven quartets on BBC television, in a series recorded at Heveningham Hall, Suffolk, and later recorded these works on disc.

Joining the quartet had necessitated leaving the New Philharmonia in 1971, but the variety of Hurwitz's activities never completely eclipsed his love of the chamber orchestra, a medium which gave him occasional scope as a concerto soloist. He recorded the Holst Double Concerto with Kenneth Sillito (conducted by Imogen Holst). In 1968 he formed the Hurwitz Chamber Orchestra, which he led without the aid of a conductor; from 1972 onwards, it appeared as the Serenata of London.

For many years Hurwitz was a professor at the RAM, and then taught a stream of students at home; his aim was to encourage players to make a first-class sound, and never be deterred by technical problems, for which he had a wide repertory of solutions. He was an influential member of the European String Teachers' Association, and conducted children and students after his wife Kay started Youth Music in Hampstead, as well as in summer courses and as a visiting teacher at specialist schools. In 1978, he was made a CBE.

He was also a well-known figure at London's instrument auctions, particularly when it came to buying bows, an area in which he could offer students reliable advice. Throughout his life he retained an enthusiasm for music and teaching which he never stopped conveying to others. He leaves Kay, his cellist son Michael, and stepdaughter Jackie, from Kay's first marriage.

Christopher Driver writes: By luck, I knew Manny and his family of musicians for some 25 years; I was also invited to meet the Aeolian players and listen to them all talking separately about each other. Apart from the finished Haydn records and musicians' reminiscences, relaxed conversation was the only way to convey the unmistakable particularity of the man. In addition to attending the RAM, he had studied with Bronislaw Huberman, the extraordinary soloist whose imagination could conjure up notes capable of "wrong" intonation and make them more interesting. Hurwitz had the same gift, according to a few wicked critics.

Margaret Major, the violist, said: "Manny was one of those very, very rare violinists who is highly conscious of the variation within all kinds of music." Yes - and he used words with equal variations. A note I made of an Aeolian Quartet rehearsal includes Manny saying: "It's Moth's [Major's] tune. It's not a question of the others playing more softly but of being a bit woollier while she's ridgier. A nice woofle underneath her."

Similarly, Raymond Keenlyside described Manny as "a person who remembers what it was like to be hungry when he was young and cannot, ever, stop eating too quickly. He came and played with us for a whole evening after we had lost our leader suddenly, which had left us in the lurch. We didn't need more than that evening. We were very lucky. The difficulty was to pin Manny down, because he had many talents, with fingers in many pies."

Manny read voraciously, and talked about many things apart from music. But he was absolutely fascinated by everything to do with fiddles and fiddle-playing. Keenlyside said: "He once told me that occasionally, in the middle of the night, he'd take a couple of bows by the same maker and just sit and look at them till he felt he knew how the man did it.

"And I remember one afternoon in Sydney. He'd got it into his head that a dealer's particular bow might be by the maker Tubbs. Manny was there for three hours. He must have tried every fiddle in the shop. He didn't ask to try the bows, because then the dealer would have known what he was after. He tried the fiddles, which he was not interested in at all, and kept picking up different bows to play them with until he came round to the one he wanted. Then he decided it wasn't a Tubbs bow and came away. He was the most generous person in all sorts of ways, but getting a Jewish bargain is like a game you play, watching every move."

· Emanuel Henry Hurwitz, violinist, born May 7 1919; died November 19 2006