Dr. Julian Ralph Einstein, musician and scientist who had lived in Oak Ridge since 1965, died Tuesday night, Dec. 28, 1999, at Methodist Medical Center of Oak Ridge. He was 74.

Dr. Einstein was born and raised in Providence, R.I., where his parents, Arthur and Essie Einstein, now deceased, were well-known locally as piano teachers and for their contributions to the Jewish community. Music was an integral part of growing up for him, and under his father's tutelage, he became an accomplished pianist at an early age.

In an article written by Vera Maya and published in The Oak Ridger in 1997, Dr. Einstein recalled sitting in the choir loft of the synagogue during services and listening to his father conduct the choir and play the organ while his mother sang in the choir.

Most of the music played was composed by one composer in Odessa, Russia, from where his father had emigrated, and had been arranged by his father. According to the article, while he was a graduate student at Yale University, Dr. Einstein became the organist and choir director in another synagogue while his father continued the same job in the original synagogue.

Throughout his life, his exceptional ability and love for music enriched not only his own life but also the lives of others, his family said.

Pursuing an interest in science, he attended Yale University, receiving a bachelor of science degree in physics with honors in 1944. He then joined the U.S. Navy as an electronics technician's mate, serving until 1946. Later that year, he re-enrolled at Yale and had completed his bachelor's and master's degrees in music by 1949.

Dr. Einstein worked in New York as a concert pianist, accompanist and piano teacher until 1951 when he was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship, which supported his studies in France at the Conservatoire National de Paris.

During his fellowship, he decided that science would be his career, and he worked an additional year in Paris at the Institut Pasteur before returning to the United States. He received his doctorate in biochemistry from Harvard University in 1959.

While working at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in X-ray diffraction studies, he met Gila Altschuler, whom he married in 1960.

After their first two children, Ruth and David, were born, the family moved to Oak Ridge where he joined Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Biology Division and where daughter Miriam was born. He most recently worked as a staff scientist in the Computational Biosciences Section of the Life Sciences Division at ORNL where he was involved in computational predication and recognition of protein structures.

Although he had a career at ORNL, Dr. Einstein remained one of the Oak Ridge Symphony Orchestra's most frequent and popular concert pianists. He also performed in Oak Ridge Civic Music Association coffee concerts and as an accompanist for young musicians in the Youth Alijah concerts.

"He was a wonderful concert pianist who gave up a piano career to be a scientist, but in Oak Ridge he found both," said Becky Ball, music critic for The Oak Ridger. "He was a wonderful person," she added.

"I always had deepest respect for him as a musician," said Vera Maya. "We used to play duos together and one of the things I enjoyed about music most was playing with him. He was a wonderful person and a very good friend. You could always count on him for anything."

Dr. Einstein was a member of the Jewish Congregation of Oak Ridge and was actively involved in Jewish community affairs.

He is survived by his wife, Gila Einstein; three children, Ruth, David and Miriam; and his brother, Ted Einstein.

The funeral will be held at 1 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 30, in the chapel of McCarty-Martin Oak Ridge Funeral Home with Rabbi Victor Rashkovsky officiating.

The family requests any memorials be in the form of donations to a charity of the donor's choice.