Ruth Slenczynska was born on January 15, 1925 and she is celebrating her 100th birthday on the day this page is being published. The American-born pianist has the distinction of having had lessons with a truly unique combination of legendary pianists: Josef Hofmann, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Alfred Cortot, Artur Schnabel, and Egon Petri. As a child […]

When I first started collecting records, Harold C Schonberg’s book The Great Pianists was my training manual. I dutifully read through it (more than once), making a list of names of pianists he recommended and revisiting his beautiful descriptions of their playing. In my regular jaunts to second-hand stores in my hometown of Montreal, I […]

The French pianist and pedagogue Marguerite Long was born on November 13, 1874. Over the course of her 91 years, she would become among the most prominent pianists and teachers of her generation. Long’s elder sister Claire had a great influence on Marguerite. In 1883, Claire became Professor of Piano at the Nîmes conservatory and […]