Skip to content
Curated category

19th-century male pianists

  • Ludwig van BeethovenLudwig van Beethoven could no longer hear the applause his own music had earned. At the premiere on the 7th of May 1824, the contralto Caroline Unger had to…
  • Friedrich NietzscheOn the 3rd of January 1889, in the streets of Turin, Friedrich Nietzsche caused a public disturbance and two policemen approached him.
  • Johannes BrahmsJohannes Brahms once interrupted a friend's toast in Berlin with five blunt words: "Quite right; here's Mozart's health." It was January 1896, near the end…
  • Robert SchumannRobert Schumann was born on the 8th of June 1810 in Zwickau, in the Kingdom of Saxony, into a family of booksellers and translators with no particular…
  • Franz SchubertFranz Peter Schubert was born in the Himmelpfortgrund suburb of Vienna on the 31st of January 1797, the twelfth child of a parish schoolmaster and a…
  • Pyotr Ilyich TchaikovskyPyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky once listened to a playback of his own voice on an Edison recording device and said: "This trill could be better." That was January…
  • Felix MendelssohnFelix Mendelssohn was born on the 3rd of February 1809 in Hamburg, in the same house where, exactly one year later, the violinist Ferdinand David would be…
  • Antonín DvořákAntonín Dvořák composed the String Quartet in F major in just three days during a summer holiday in Spillville, Iowa, in 1893. Three days.
  • Sergei RachmaninoffSergei Rachmaninoff stepped onto the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre in May 1892 knowing, he later admitted, that his one-act opera was "sure to fail." He was…
  • Alexander ScriabinAlexander Scriabin died on the 14th of April 1915 from a pimple. That sentence sounds absurd, but it is true. A small sore on his upper lip, first noticed as…
  • Carl CzernyCarl Czerny was born on the 21st of February 1791 in Vienna's Leopoldstadt district, and he died in the same city on the 15th of July 1857, having never once…
  • Johann Nepomuk HummelJohann Nepomuk Hummel was taught piano by Mozart at the age of eight, housed and tutored free of charge for two years by the most celebrated composer in…
  • Anton RubinsteinAnton Rubinstein once told a young Josef Hofmann, "When you are as old as I am, you may do as I do. If you can." That final dare captures the man entirely.