Ania Dorfmann

In its heyday, Odessa used to be called “the pearl of the Black Sea.” Music lovers, however, look upon Odessa as a different kind of pearl, one that was a breeding ground for pianists. The list of pianists born in Odessa is legion, and includes several generations of performing legends like Maria Grinberg, Emil Gilels, Samuel Feinberg, Benno Moiseiwitsch, Vladimir de Pachmann, Simon Barere, Yakov Zak and Shura Cherkassky. To this list one must add Ania Dorfmann, who came to international attention in the 1930s and 40s before she settled into full-time teaching. Born on July 9, 1899, Dorfmann gave her first concert at eleven, and around that time she accompanied a slightly younger violinist named Jascha Heifetz.

Although Dorfmann was accepted into the Paris Conservatory at twelve to study with the renowned pedagogue Isidor Philipp, she rarely, if ever, mentioned him in later years. According to one of her Juilliard students, Alexander Peskanov, Dorfmann basically claimed that she was self-taught, except for a few adulthood lessons with Artur Schnabel, whom she revered. Be that as it may, Philipp’s emphasis on clarity and finger independence must have seeped through his independent-minded young charge. And it was through Philipp that Dorfmann participated in a memorable marathon concert at the Salle Érard on June 1, 1921, featuring the five Piano Concertos of Camille Saint-Saëns, that took place six months before the composer’s death. By then the hard-working and ambitious young pianist had made substantial professional headway in Europe.

Between 1931 and 1938 Dorfmann made a series of recordings for the British Columbia label. On the heels of her European successes, Dorfmann made her American recital debut on November 27, 1936 at New York’s Town Hall. Additional Town Hall recitals in 1937 and 1938 caught the attention of RCA Victor President David Sarnoff, who recommended her to Arturo Toscanini for his 1939 NBC Symphony Beethoven cycle. The Maestro engaged Dorfmann for the Choral Fantasy (a work he had not conducted before and would not conduct again) broadcast from Carnegie Hall on December 2, 1939. Apparently this was the first time that Toscanini had conducted a female piano soloist. Notwithstanding some untidy moments, the Maestro was pleased enough to re-engage Dorfmann in 1942 for the Triple Concerto with the New York Philharmonic. Two years later she played the First Concerto as part of Toscanini’s 1944 Beethoven cycle, again broadcast by NBC. Dorfmann and Toscanini teamed up to record it for RCA Victor the following year. It is, in the main, a fleet and lithe reading, served up with rollicking abandon and chamber-like transparency. Such an approach suffuses the music with an almost Rossini-esque sensibility that suits early Beethoven to a proverbial tee.

In the aftermath of the Beethoven sessions, Dorfmann became part of RCA Victor’s piano roster, keeping company with label mates such as Arthur Rubinstein, José Iturbi, Alexander Brailowsky, William Kapell, Byron Janis and her close friend Vladimir Horowitz. While her recorded output was not particularly large, it nevertheless covered a wide stylistic range, governed, however, by a strong streak of classicism. “Ania was very economical with the pedal,” recalled Peskanov, “and she only used it when it was really needed. Her playing was always beautifully voiced, transparent, and well balanced. Even though Ania played Classical and Baroque works extremely well,” Peskanov recalls, “she was really a Romantic pianist, whose approach was extremely spontaneous. She never played anything twice the same way.” This point particularly hits home when comparing Dorfmann’s 1947 selections from Schumann’s Fantasiestücke op. 12 to her complete 1958 recording of the whole cycle. The latter was coupled with a performance of Schumann’s Carnaval that is both classically poised and fancifully detailed. These proved to be Dorfmann’s last studio recordings, and the only ones that preserve her artistry in stereo. With the onset of arthritis, Dorfmann gradually retreated from public performance and focused more on teaching. She was a mainstay of the Juilliard School of Music’s piano faculty until her retirement in 1983. She died but the next year, in New York City. © SM/Qobuz