Claudio Arrau
A patrician artist whose matinee-idol appearance was as elegant as his playing, Claudio Arrau achieved a major reputation for his performances of Brahms and Liszt. Indeed, few Romantic-period composers, from Beethoven onward, were beyond his grasp. In addition to that repertory, his Debussy was regarded by many connoisseurs as exemplary. Arrau believed that his abiding interest in psychoanalysis aided him in probing the intent of those whose works he performed. Certainly, Arrau's performances were marked by a balance between heart and intellect.
Arrau was born in Chillán, Chile, on February 6, 1903. He received piano instruction from his mother at an early age, making his debut performance in Santiago at the age of five playing Mozart, Beethoven, and Chopin. At the age of 10 the Chilean government sent him to Berlin, where he enrolled in Stern's Conservatory of Music. His teacher there was Martin Krause. While studying he entered competitions, and won the Ibach Prize and the Gustav Holländer Medal. He also began giving recitals in Germany and Scandinavia, earning excited comment over the excellence of his technique, and the maturity of his interpretations. In 1918 he made a major European tour, giving concertos accompanied by illustrious conductors such as Nikisch, Furtwängler, and Mengelberg. He returned to South America in 1921, and made a triumphal tour beginning in Santiago de Chile. He made his first North American tour in 1924, appearing with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He joined the faculty of the Stern Conservatory in 1924. He won the Grand Prix Internationale des Pianistes in Geneva in 1927, and toured in the Soviet Union in 1929, and again in 1930.
He continued a notable concertizing career throughout the 1930s, including a famous series in 1935 and 1936 in Berlin, in which he played the complete keyboard works of J.S. Bach followed by the complete keyboard works of Mozart. He then announced that he would no longer play Bach, asserting that his music was not conceived for the modern grand piano. In 1938 he played all of the Beethoven piano sonatas and five piano concertos in a series of recitals in Mexico City, and repeated the feat during the next two years in Buenos Aires and Santiago. When World War II broke out he ended his association with the Stern Conservatory and returned to Chile, founding a piano school there. But the next year, after a tour of the United States where he received the highest critical acclaim, he and his family moved permanently to New York. He devoted himself to concertizing, teaching, and recording. His complete Beethoven cycles became legendary; in 1952 he performed such a series, in which each recital was broadcast live by the BBC.
After World War II his concert tours included Australia, Czechoslovakia, Romania, India, South Africa, Israel, and Japan. In the 1960s he made definitive recordings of the complete Beethoven piano sonatas; he also supervised the editing and publication of an Urtext edition of the same sonatas. In the 1970s, Chile, which had enjoyed a record as one of South America's most democratic nations, fell to the military government of Pinochet. In protest, Arrau gave up his Chilean citizenship in 1978, and became a naturalized citizen of the U.S. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, he continued to be a revered figure in Chile; in 1983 he was awarded the Chilean National Arts Prize. He returned at the age of 81 to tour Chile in 1984, his first performances there in 17 years. He died in Mürzzuschlag, Austria, on June 9, 1991.
© TiVo
Similar artists
-
Chopin: 26 Preludes; 4 Impromptus
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 1990
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
The Art of Arrau
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on Jul 9, 2021
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Brahms: Piano Concertos Nos.1 & 2/Haydn Variations etc.
Claudio Arrau, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Bernard Haitink
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 1993
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Nos. 3 & 8 "Pathétique"
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 1986
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Arrau spielt Liszt (Eloquence)
Classical - Released by Decca on Jan 1, 2011
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Arrau plays Liszt
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on Dec 2, 2022
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Nos. 21 & 30; Andante favori
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Mar 24, 1986
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Liszt: The Great Transcriptions
Claudio Arrau, Michele Campanella, Misha Dichter, Zoltán Kocsis, Alexander Uninsky
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 1997
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Brahms: Concertos pour piano Nos. 1 & 2 - Variations sur un thème de Haydn - Ouverture tragique
Claudio Arrau, Philharmonia Orchestra, Carlo Maria Giulini
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on May 25, 2002
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mozart: Piano Sonatas Nos. 17 & 18
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 1984
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Arrau: Beethoven - Diabelli Variations & Sonatas
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on Mar 13, 2023
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Chopin: The Nocturnes
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 1978
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Claudio Arrau plays Chopin
Claudio Arrau, Frédéric Chopin
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on Jul 9, 2021
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Claudio Arrau Plays Schubert (Remastered)
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Nov 11, 2022
24-Bit 192.0 kHz - Stereo -
Claudio Arrau Plays Beethoven (Remastered)
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Nov 4, 2022
24-Bit 192.0 kHz - Stereo -
Claudio Arrau Plays Brahms
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Nov 25, 2022
24-Bit 192.0 kHz - Stereo -
Chopin: Piano Encores
Claudio Arrau, Zoltán Kocsis, Stephen Kovacevich
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 2011
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Arrau: Mozart & Chopin
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on Feb 3, 2023
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mozart: Piano Sonatas Nos. 1 & 3
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 1990
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mozart: Piano Sonatas Nos. 4, 5 & 16
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on Jan 1, 1987
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Brahms, Beethoven & R. Schumann: Piano Concertos (Live)
Claudio Arrau, Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart des SDR, Südwestfunk Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden, Eliahu Inbal, Ernest Bour, Gary Bertini
Classical - Released by SWR Classic on Oct 18, 2019
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo