Sergey Rachmaninoff
Romantic Composer, Pianist and Conductor, Piano Virtuoso
Sergei Rachmaninoff (Rachmaninov or Rakhmaninov) was a Russian-born American composer, conductor and brilliant pianist. He was born in Semyonovo, 1 April 1873 and died of cancer in Beverly Hills, California, 28 March 1943. He was a protégé of Tchaikovsky. His music belongs to both 18th-century Classicism and 19th-century Romanticism.
He studied at the St. Petersburg Conservatory and later at the Moscow Conservatory. It was during this time he showed himself to be an outstanding pianist. Aged 18, he wrote his first piano concerto and his well-known Prelude C-Sharp. Two years later, he scored success with Aleko, his first opera composition as his graduation work.
Symphony No. 1, written in 1895, was not successful causing him emotional stress. With the help of a hypnotist Dr. Dahl, he returned to composition. His confidence returned with the huge success of his Piano Concerto No.2 in C minor six years later. He dedicated this concerto to Dr. Dahl. The following year he married his cousin Natalya Satina (Natalie Satin.)
In 1905 he became conductor in Moscow, first, of the Imperial Grand Opera and continued at the Bolshoi Theatre, for which he composed two operas, Francesca da Rimini and The Miserly Knight. Opera was not his forte. In 1907, he lived in Dresden where he wrote Symphony No. 2 and the symphonic poem The Isle of the Dead (1909).
His first concert tour of USA was in 1909, writing Piano Concerto No. 3 for the occasion and playing it himself. By this time, Rachmaninoff had established himself to be one of the greatest pianist, and through his life.
Rachmaninoff was disenchanted with the Russian revolutionary government, left Russia in 1917 and settled in New York, where he lived and continued his musical career. In between, he spent periods in Paris, Dresden and Switzerland. In Paris, he founded a publishing firm.
There was a period of creative silence until 1926 when he wrote the Piano Concerto No. 4, followed by a handful of works over the next 15 years. During this time, however, he was active as a pianist on both sides of the Atlantic though never again in Russia.
Rachmaninoff's works
- Opera Aleko
- Three symphonies
- Opera, Skupoy Ritsar (The Miserly Knight)
- Piano Concerto No.1
- Piano Concertos No. 2 in C minor, op18
- Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor, Op.30 (1909)
- Piano Concerto No.4
- Piano pieces including Prelude in C-Sharp Minor
- Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini for piano and orchestra
- Choral music
- Chamber music
- Songs
He gripped audiences worldwide when his Piano Concerto No. 2 was used as soundtrack in the British classic film Brief Encounter, transposed into a popular poignant love song “Full Moon and Empty Arms”; followed by Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini for piano and orchestra, used in the film Somewhere in Time; and a third one, Piano Concerto no. 3 used in another smash film Shine, the story of David Helfgott.
Recommended CDs:
Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No.2 in C Minor; Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini
Sergey Rachmaninoff, American Composer
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