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Biography
Infobox musical artist| name = Emil Gilels| image =| caption = Emil Gilels in concert| background = non_performing_personnel| birth_name = Emil Grigoryevich Gilels| birth_date = Birth date|1916|10|19| birthplace = Odessa , Russian Empire | death_date = Death date and age|1985|10|14|1916|10|19| deathplace = Moscow , USSR | instrument = Piano | genre = Classical| occupation = pianist , pedagogue | years_active = Emil Grigoryevich Gilels (lang-uk|???´?? ?????´????? ??´?????, lang-ru|???´?? ?????´?????? ??´?????, lang|ru-Latn|Emil Grigorievic Gilels ; October 19, 1916 & ndash; October 14, 1985) was a Soviet Union|Soviet pianist , widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century. His last name is sometimes transliterated Hilels .cite book |pages=214 |first=Hewlett |last=Johnson |title=The Soviet Power; the Socialist Sixth of the World |location=New York |publisher=International Publishers |year=1941 |oclc=407142 cite book |pages=46 |title= U.S.S.R. Speaks for Itself Volume Three: Democracy in Practice |location=London |publisher=Lawrence & Wishart |year=1941 |oclc=13487651
Biography
Gilels was born in Odessa , Russian Empire (now part of Ukraine ) to a Jewish family with no direct musical background that nevertheless owned a piano. http://www.emilgilels.com/life.php The Emil Gilels Project - Life He began studying the piano at the age of five under Yakov Tkach , who was a student of the French pianists Raoul Pugno http://www.naxos.com/artistinfo/bio14380.htm Gilels biography on Naxos.com and Alexander Villoing Thus, through Tkach, Gilels had a pedagogical genealogy stretching back to Frédéric Chopin , via Pugno, and to Muzio Clementi , via Villoing. Tkach was a stern disciplinarian who emphasized scales and studies. Gilels later credited this strict training for establishing the foundation of his technique.cite book |url= http://books.google.com/books? id=_hFIZD5bnVgC& pg=RA1-PA120& vq=tcatch+was+very+stern+with+me& dq=%22Great+Contemporary+Pianists+Speak+for+Themselves%22& sig=G4hQCKDub3dFpbnUir8qeEVdIGM |pages=120 |first=Elyse |last=Mach |title=Great Contemporary Pianists Speak for Themselves |location=New York |publisher=Dover Publications |year=1991 |isbn=0-486-26695-8
Gilels made his public debut at the age of 12 in June 1929 with a well-received program of Ludwig van Beethoven|Beethoven , Domenico Scarlatti|Scarlatti , Frédéric Chopin|Chopin , and Robert Schumann|Schumann . In 1930, Gilels entered the Odessa Conservatory where he was coached by Berta Reingbald , whom Gilels credited as a formative influence. Also in Odessa Conservatory Gilels studied special harmony and polyphony with professor Mykola Vilinsky .Emil Gilels performed virtuoso Ballade in Form of Variations by M. Vilinsky (see, L.A.Barenboim, Emil Gilels : tvorcheskii portret artista. Moscow : Sov. kompozitor, 1990, p.55 http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/27443469& referer=brief_results)
After graduating from the Odessa Conservatory in 1935, he moved to Moscow where he studied under Heinrich Neuhaus until 1937. Neuhaus was a student of Aleksander Michalowski , who had studied with Karol Mikuli|Carl Mikuli , Chopin's student, assistant and editor.
A year later he was awarded first prize at the II Queen Elisabeth Music Competition|1938 Queen Elisabeth Music Competition|Ysaÿe International Festival in Brussels by a distinguished jury whose members included Arthur Rubinstein , Samuil Feinberg , Emil von Sauer , Ignaz Friedman , Walter Gieseking , Robert Casadesus , and Arthur Bliss .Facsimile of Gilels's 1938 Ysaÿe Competition First Prize Certificate in: S. Khentova, Emil Gilels (unknown publisher, Moscow 1959). His winning performances were of both volumes of the Johannes Brahms|Brahms Paganini Variations , and the Franz Liszt|Liszt - Ferruccio Busoni|Busoni ''Fantasie on Two Motives from Mozart's "Marriage of Figaro" . The other competitors included Moura Lympany in second place, and Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli in seventh place.cite web |url= http://www.concours-reine-elisabeth.be/files/1937-2007.pdf |title=Queen Elisabeth Music Competition prize winners since 1937 |accessdate=2007-11-10 |format=PDF Michelangeli and Lympany took 7th and 2nd place respectively.
Following his triumph at Brussels, a scheduled United States|American debut at the 1939 New York World's Fair was aborted because of the outbreak of the Second World War. During the War, Gilels entertained Soviet troops with morale-boosting open-air recitals on the frontline, of which film archive footage exists."Emil Gilels Plays", Russian television documentary, VHS release on Japanese label IVC, cat. no. IVCV-64144 In 1945, he formed a chamber music trio with the violinist Leonid Kogan (his brother-in-law) and the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich . Gilels was awarded the Stalin Prize in 1946.
Gilels had a stable and happy family life, marrying Fariset (Lala) Hutsistova, a graduate of Moscow Conservatoire, in 1947. He lived with her all his life; they had a daughter Elena, an excellent pianist who graduated from Flier’s class of Moscow Conservatoire. She played in an ensemble with her father. Among Mozart’s double Es-dur concerto, Schubert’s f-moll Fantasy played with Elena and recorded (conductors Rudolf Barshai and Karl Böhm) were included into Gilels’s masterpieces. http://www.emilgilels.com/life.php#1941 The Emil Gilels Project
After the war, he toured the Soviet Bloc countries of Eastern Europe as a soloist. He also gave two-piano recitals with Yakov Flier , as well as concerts with his violinist sister, Elizaveta.
Gilels was one of the first Soviet artists, along with David Oistrakh , allowed to travel and concertize in the Western world|West . His delayed United States|American debut in 1955 playing Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky|Tchaikovsky 's Piano Concerto No. 1 (Tchaikovsky)|Piano Concerto No. 1 in Philadelphia with Eugene Ormandy was a great success. His British debut in 1959 met with similar acclaim.
In 1952, he became a professor at the Moscow Conservatory , where his students included Valery Afanassiev , http://einam.com/pages/russian.htm einam.com Marina Goglidze-Mdivani and Felix Gottlieb . http://www.felixgottlieb.com/eng/bio.htm felixgottlieb.com As chair of the jury of the International Tchaikovsky Competition at the sensational inaugural event in 1958, he awarded first prize to Van Cliburn . He presided over the competition for many years.
Gilels made his Salzburg Festival debut in 1969 with a piano recital of Weber, Prokofiev and Beethoven at the Mozarteum , followed by a performance of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 3 (Beethoven)|Third Piano Concerto with George Szell and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. Although paraded the world over as a Soviet loyalist, Gilels would occasionally confide his torments under the system to sympathetic fellow-artists . http://www.artsjournal.com/slippeddisc/2010/12/the_secret_torments_of_emil_gi.html
In 1981, he suffered a heart attack after a recital at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam , http://phonoarchive.org/grove/Entries/S11135.htm Gilels, Emil (Grigor'yevich)Dead link|date=April 2009 and suffered declining health thereafter. He died unexpectedly during a medical checkup in Moscow on 14 October 1985, only a few days before his 69th birthday. Sviatoslav Richter , who knew Gilels well and was a fellow-student in the class of Heinrich Neuhaus at the Moscow Conservatory, believed that Gilels was killed accidentally when an incompetent doctor at the Kremlin hospital inappropriately gave him an injection of a drug during a routine checkup.cite book |first=Sviatoslav |last=Richter |coauthors=Bruno Monsaingeon, Stewart Spencer (trans.) |title=Sviatoslav Richter: Notebooks and Conversations |publisher=Princeton University Press |location=Princeton, NJ |year=2001 |pages=32 |isbn=0-691-07438-0
However, Danish composer and writer Karl Aage Rasmussen, in his biography of Richter, denies this possibility and contends that it was just a false rumour.Karl Aage Rasmussen, "Sviatoslav Richter - Pianist", Northeastern University Press, 2010
Notable repertoire and assessment
Gilels is universally admired for his superb technical control and burnished tone. http://www.emil-gilels.com/ "Emil Gilels", In Memory of Emil Gilels , 2007. Accessed June 3, 2007.
He had an extensive piano repertoire|repertoire , from baroque to late Romantic and 20th century classical composers. His interpretations of the central German-Austrian classics formed the core of his repertoire, in particular Ludwig van Beethoven|Beethoven , Johannes Brahms|Brahms , and Robert Schumann|Schumann ; but he was equally illuminative with Domenico Scarlatti|Scarlatti and 20th-century composers such as Claude Debussy|Debussy , Sergei Rachmaninoff|Rachmaninoff , and Sergei Prokofiev|Prokofiev . His Franz Liszt|Liszt was also first-class, and his recordings of the Hungarian Rhapsodies|Hungarian Rhapsody No. 9 and the Piano Sonata (Liszt)|Sonata in B minor have acquired classic status in some circles.International Piano Quarterly, Winter 2001, Orpheus Publications Limited
Gilels premiered Prokofiev's Piano Sonata No. 8 (Prokofiev)|8th Piano Sonata , dedicated to Mira Mendelssohn, on December 30, 1944, in the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory.cite web|title=Piano Sonata No. 8 in B flat major, Op. 84|url= http://www.prokofiev.org/catalog/workall.cfm? WorkID=94|publisher=Prokofiev.org|accessdate=2008-01-26
He was in the midst of completing a recording cycle of Beethoven's piano sonatas for the German record company Deutsche Grammophon when he died. His recording of the Piano Sonata No. 29 (Beethoven)|"Hammerklavier" Sonata received a Gramophone Award in 1984.
Gilels recorded with his daughter Elena Gilels , including Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 10 (Mozart)|double piano concerto with Karl Böhm and the Vienna Philharmonic and Schubert's Fantasia in F minor for piano four-hands|Fantasie in F minor for piano duet . He also made some outstanding chamber recordings with the violinist Leonid Kogan and the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich .
Prizes, awards and honors
;Soviet Union
1st Prize, All-Soviet Union Piano Competition, 1933
2nd Prize, Vienna International Piano Competition, 1936
II Queen Elisabeth Music Competition|1st Prize, Concours Eugène Ysaÿe, Brussels , 1938
Stalin Prize , USSR, 1946
People's Artist of the USSR , 1954
Three Orders of Lenin , USSR, including 1961
Lenin Prize , 1962
Hero of Socialist Labour
Order of the Red Banner of Labour
Order of the Friendship of Peoples
Order of the Badge of Honour
;Foreign
Order of Commandeur Mérite Culturel et Artistique de Paris , 1967
Gold Medal of the City of Paris, France
Order of Leopold (Belgium)
Honorary Member, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia , Rome
Honorary Member, Royal Academy of Music , London
Honorary Professor, Franz Liszt Academy of Music , Budapest
Discography highlights
1935 - Franz Liszt|Liszt : '' Fantasie on Two Motives from Mozart's "Marriage of Figaro"|Fantasia on Themes from Mozart's Marriage of Figaro .
1951 - Franz Liszt|Liszt : Hungarian Rhapsodies|Hungarian Rhapsody No. 9.
1954 - Camille Saint-Saëns|Saint-Saëns : Piano Concerto No. 2 (Saint-Saëns)|Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 22 (cond. Cluytens)*.
1954 - Nikolai Medtner|Medtner : Piano Sonata No. 5 in G Minor, Op. 22.
1955 - Sergei Rachmaninoff|Rachmaninoff : Piano Concerto No. 3 (Rachmaninoff)|Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor, Op. 30 (cond. Cluytens).
1958 - Johannes Brahms|Brahms : Piano Concerto No. 2 (Brahms)|Piano Concerto No. 2 in B flat major, Op. 83 (cond. Fritz Reiner|Reiner ).
1957 - Ludwig van Beethoven|Beethoven : Piano Concerto No. 4 (Beethoven)|Piano Concerto No. 4 (cond. Ludwig).
1957 - Alexander Scriabin|Scriabin : Sonata No. 4 (Scriabin)|Piano Sonata No. 4 in F sharp major, Op. 30*.
1957 - Mieczyslaw Weinberg|Weinberg : Piano Sonata No. 4 in B Minor.
1961 - Prelude in B minor (J. S. Bach, arranged Siloti) * (Moscow)
1968 - Nikolai Medtner|Medtner : Piano Sonata No. 10 in A minor, Op. 38 No. 1. ("Sonata Reminiscenza")* (Moscow)
1968 - Liszt: Rhapsodie espagnole* (Leningrad)
1972 - Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky|Tchaikovsky : Piano Concerto No. 2 (Tchaikovsky)|Piano Concerto No. 2 in G major, Op. 44 (cond. Lorin Maazel|Maazel ).
1972 - Johannes Brahms|Brahms : Piano Concerto No. 1 (Brahms)|Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15 and Piano Concerto No. 2 (Brahms)|Piano Concerto No. 2 in B flat major, Op. 83 (cond. Eugen Jochum|Jochum ).
1973 - Ludwig van Beethoven|Beethoven : Piano Sonata No. 23 (Beethoven)|Piano Sonata No. 23 in F minor, Op. 57 Appassionata .
1973 - Claude Debussy|Debussy : Images, Book 1 *.
1973 - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart|Mozart : Piano Concerto No. 27 (Mozart)|Piano Concerto No. 27 in B flat major, K595 (cond. Karl Böhm|Boehm ).
1974 - Edvard Grieg|Grieg : Lyric Pieces http://www.gramophone.net/ClassicReview/View/238/Emil%20Gilels%27s%20searching%20recording%20of%20Grieg%27s%20Lyric%20Pieces.
1974 - Sergei Prokofiev|Prokofiev : Sonata No. 8 in B flat major, Op. 84.
1976 - Franz Schubert|Schubert : Forellenquintett (" Trout Quintet ") Quintet for Piano, Violin, Violoncello, and Contrabass in A major D667 (with Amadeus Quartet )
1977 - Sergei Rachmaninoff|Rachmaninoff , Prelude in C-sharp minor (Rachmaninoff)|Prelude in C-sharp minor Op. 3 No. 2 * (Moscow)
1978 - Frédéric Chopin|Chopin : Piano Sonata No. 3 (Chopin)|Piano Sonata No. 3 in B minor, Op. 58.
1982 - Ludwig van Beethoven|Beethoven : Piano Sonata No. 29 (Beethoven)|Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, Op. 106 Hammerklavier (Berlin)
1984 - Ludwig van Beethoven|Beethoven : Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, Op. 106 Hammerklavier * (Moscow)
http://www.emilgilels.com/index1.php In Memoriam - Emil Gilels, compiled by Christian Pohl
Persondata | NAME = Gilels, Emil | ALTERNATIVE NAMES = | SHORT DESCRIPTION = | DATE OF BIRTH = 1916-10-19 | PLACE OF BIRTH = Odessa , Russian Empire | DATE OF DEATH = 1985-10-14 | PLACE OF DEATH = Moscow , USSR DEFAULTSORT:Gilels, Emil Category:Russian classical pianists Category:Soviet classical pianists Category:Russian Jews Category:Jewish classical pianists Category:Ukrainian classical pianists Category:Stalin Prize winners Category:Heroes of Socialist Labour Category:People's Artists of the USSR Category:Recipients of the Order of Lenin, three times Category:Lenin Prize winners Category:Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour Category:Recipients of the Order of Friendship of Peoples Category:Recipients of the Order of the Badge of Honour Category:Recipients of the Order of Leopold (Belgium) Category:Honorary members of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia Category:Prize-winners of the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition Category:Honorary Members of the Royal Academy of Music Category:Moscow Conservatory alumni Category:People from Odessa Category:1985 deaths Category:1916 births Category:Soviet Jews
