Andrei gavrilov rachmaninov biography

Early life and music career.
Andrei came to the public's attention in 1974 when he won the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow and he's been playing to great.
Andrei Gavrilov was born into a family of artists in Moscow; his mother was the Armenian pianist Assanetta Eguiserian (December 20, 1925.

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Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto by no means falls into the category of “academically classical music”. Rather, it is a bright example of “sublime popular music”. This is a perfectly new genre still only subconsciously perceived by people, but having no formal definition as a unique genre.

Rachmaninov’s piano technique and his gift for composing bring his popular music to unattainable heights. And yet, it is not an academically serious music with the distinctive features of deep, philosophically saturated thought, but fine “sublime popular music”, just like many other works of Rachmaninov’s.

Popular music has three distinctive features, three basic principles: sensualism, simplicity of the music language, and “drive”. Rachmaninov is not one of the so called “composers-philosophers”. His best works are based on a feeling of profound love, “musical art”, and poetry.

Without doubt, his Second Concerto is his best piano concerto; moreover, it is his best composition for piano. Never before or since was Rachmaninov able to express the spirituality of a loving heart in h

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My twenty-sixth interview is with the Russian concert pianist Andrei Gavrilov, who I met at Monkton Combe School near Bath (in the UK) before he gave a series of master classes.

Find out more about Andrei, here.

For those who prefer to read the interview, the here’s transcript:

MELANIE SPANSWICK: My classical conversation today is with Russian concert pianist Andrei Gavrilov. Andrei came to the public’s attention in 1974 when he won the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow and he’s been playing to great acclaim ever since. I’m delighted that he’s joining me here at Monkton Combe School in Bath. Welcome.

ANDREI GAVRILOV: Thank you very much.

MS: Lovely to be here talking to you. I’m going to start by asking: How old were you when you began? What was the catalyst? Whether you come from a musical family?

AG: Yes, that’s very trivial, err the musical mum, she was a pupil of Neuhaus, a very famous teacher in Moscow Conservatory, and I constantly was surrounded by music, but it happened accidentally. I heard a live radio trans

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Andrei Gavrilov

The pianist ANDREI GAVRILOV (1955) was born into a family of artists in Moscow. His father,Vladimir Gavrilov, is one of the eminent Russian artists, and his mother, Assanetta Eguiserian, was a pianist. At the age of 6, the future musician was inducted at the Moscow Central Music School and became a student of Tatyana Kestner, and at the Moscow Conservatory his teacher was Lev Naumov. In 1974, the talented 18-year-old student won the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. In the same year he made a triumphant international dèbut at the Salzburg Festival where he substituted for the ill Sviatoslav Richter. Subsequently, the two became friends, performing together with Handel’s piano suites in Russia and abroad, there is a documentary recording of their performance at the festival in Tours.

At the age of 23, Gavrilov made his first tour with the Berliner Philharmoniker with 30 concerts in major cities around the world. A year later, while preparing for the next tour with Herbert von Karajan, he was banned from performing abroad. The rebellious musi