Eloquent Bravura

by Mark Ainley / Uncategorized / No Comments / March 19, 2011

When I visited London a couple of years ago, I went to see Jonathan Summers at the National Library. He is a walking dictionary about the piano and great pianists, and always has some interesting

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Refined Precision

by Mark Ainley / Uncategorized / 1 Comment / March 19, 2011

Geza Anda was most known for his performance of the complete Mozart Piano Concertos, particularly as his recording of the second movement of the beautiful C Major Concerto K.467 had been chosen for the popular

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Distinguished Elegance

by Mark Ainley / Uncategorized / No Comments / March 19, 2011

The French pianist Alfred Cortot soon became one of my favourite pianists – once I got used to the fact that he didn’t always hit all the notes. In our era of sterile perfection in

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Gleaming Poise

by Mark Ainley / Uncategorized / No Comments / March 19, 2011

I learned a lot about the great pianists of the past by reading Harold C Schonberg’s classic book The Great Pianists. While he went into great detail about many pianists, he didn’t talk lots about

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Rachmaninoff’s Choice

by Mark Ainley / Uncategorized / No Comments / March 19, 2011

One of the pianists whom I wanted to hear most after reading Harold C Schonberg’s tome ‘The Great Pianists’ was Josef Hofmann. Schonberg clearly idolized him and wrote about him in such detail that I

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La Dadame

by Mark Ainley / Uncategorized / No Comments / March 19, 2011

Marcelle Meyer met Debussy at the premiere performance of Erik Satie’s Parade, for which she was the pianist. To give you an idea of the production: the mise-en-scene was by Jean Cocteau, the sets were

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