Three Pianists, 2024
This Week in Classical Music: September 30, 2024. The Pianists. Final week we complained that there have been too many composers of notice; this time the scenario is reversed: solely Paul Dukas of The Sorcerer’s Apprentice fame has a birthday within the subsequent seven days. One of many few French Jewish composers, he was born on October 1st of 1865 in Paris. (And our apologies to the followers of Sir Charles Villiers Stanford, we all know you might be there).
The pianists are faring a lot better. Vladimir Horowitz was born on October 1st of 1903 in Kiev, the Russian Empire (now Kyiv, Ukraine) right into a well-off Jewish household. At 9, Horowitz entered the Kiev Conservatory the place he studied with Felix Blumenfeld, amongst others. He made his solo debut in 1920; round that point, he met the violinist Nathan Milstein, who was the identical age and confirmed nice expertise. They performed collectively in live shows (Vladimir’s sister Regina was Milstein’s accompanist). Each Horowitz and Milstein left Russia in 1925; Vladimir went first to Berlin after which to the US. His debut, on January 12th of 1928, when he performed Tchaikovsky’s First piano concerto sooner than the conductor Thomas Beecham would have it and dazzled the general public together with his approach, grew to become legendary. That was the start of probably the most good pianistic careers of the 20th century, regardless that Horowitz interrupted it 4 occasions, first from 1936 to 1938, then from 1953 to 1965, his longest absence from the live performance stage, and once more in 1969–74 and 1983–85. Altogether, he was away from the general public for a protracted 21 years. That didn’t stop him from changing into each a star and probably the most attention-grabbing pianists of the century.
Horowitz was identified to make small alterations to the rating. One instance is Mussorgsky’s Photos at an Exhibition: Horowitz felt that the composer, who wasn’t a pianist, didn’t use the instrument to its fullest extent. He added double octaves to a few of Chopin’s items. However the actual shock was Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Sonata. No person would accuse Rachmaninov, one of many best pianists of the 20th century, of not figuring out the right way to use the instrument. The sonata had two variations by then, the unique, from 1930, and a transforming made in 1931. In 1940, Horowitz recommended some modifications and Rachmaninov, who was in awe of Horowitz the pianist, consented to the alteration. Right here it’s, in Horowitz’s model, carried out reside in 1968 in Carnegie Corridor. Horowitz all the time carried out on his personal Steinways, particularly voiced by the maker. You may hear how, at round 12:25, in the course of the second motion, a string breaks – on his personal piano. After enjoying a number of extra bars, Horowitz pauses (to applause) and waits for the technician to return on stage and take away the string. He then continues. Fairly often reside recordings, regardless of some missed notes, are extra thrilling than ones made in a studio. This time the joy reached a complete new degree.
Vera Gornostayeva, a extremely regarded Soviet/Russian pianist and pedagogue was born on October 1st of 1929 in Moscow. Alexander Slobodyanik, Pavel Egorov, Eteri Andjaparidze, Ivo Pogorelich, Sergei Babayan, Vassily Primakov, Lukas Geniušas, Vadym Kholodenko, Stanislav Khristenko, and others have been her college students.
Lastly, Edwin Fischer, the Swiss pianist thought-about one of many best interpreters of Bach, was born in Basel on October 6th of 1886.