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Anatole Kitain plays Schumann Toccata Op. 7

2,225 views · Published 31 August 2010 · 4:49 · Indexed 31 October 2026

Channel: gullivior · 2010 · Music

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Anatole Kitain (17 September 1903 -- 30 July 1980) was a Russian classical pianist.
Anatole Kitain was born in Saint Petersburg into a family of professional musicians. His brothers, Robert and Boris, were violinists, and his brother Alexander was a pianist. He showed early promise, performing his own nocturne for the astonished Glazunov at the age of six. He began his studies in the Petersburg Conservatoire, but the political instability of the time led his family to move to Kiev, where he studied in the conservatoire with Sergei Tarnowsky. (Other pianists studying at the Kiev Conservatory at that time included Vladimir Horowitz, Alexander Uninsky and Alexander Brailowsky). In time, Kitain became the private pupil of Felix Blumenfeld, whose few private pupils also included Simon Barere and Horowitz.
He made several LP recordings in the US, one with his brother Robert, and gave his last concert on 22 October 1963. He died at Orange, New Jersey in 1980.

Of his European recordings, only those made for Columbia survive. They show a pianist of consummate technique and musicality, bearing many resemblances to his exact contemporaries, Horowitz and Barere. It is curious that while the two latter went on to become household names, Kitain died in obscurity.

Reviewing the album "Anatole Kitain - The Complete Columbia Recordings 1936-39", Classic CD magazine wrote: On the evidence of these 26 titles, lovingly remastered in almost uniformly remarkable sound, here is one of the major pianists of the century... I would definitely put this important release into my Top Fifty All-time Great Piano recordings without a doubt.
(from Wikipedia)

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