"I consider you the greatest musical talent in present-day Russia", Russian music critic Hermann Laroche is said to have told Peter I. Tschaikowsky (born on April 25th 1840 in Votkinsk). And indeed, with his emotion-laden, voluptuous music, the…

"For the first time in my life, I feel forced to start a new work without completing the previous one. Until now I always held fast to the rule that as long as an old one was unfinished I would never start a new one. But this time I just couldn´t…

Opinions once varied on the music of Anton Bruckner (born on September 4, 1824 in Ansfelden, near Linz), who ranks amongst the great symphonists after Beethoven. While one faction regarded him as a destroyer of traditions, the other side ecstatically…

Born in Moscow, Valery Gergiev initially studied conducting under Ilya Musin at the Leningrad Conservatory. While still a student, he won the Herbert von Karajan conducting competition in Berlin. In 1978, aged 24, Valery Gergiev became assistant…

Leonidas Kavakos was born in Athens and by the age of 21, had won three major competitions: the Sibelius Competition in 1985, and the Paganini and Naumburg competitions in 1988. This success led to him make the first recording in history of the…