Nikolai Dahl

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Nikolai Vladimirovich Dahl (Russian: Николай Владимирович Даль) (1860 - 1939) was a Russian physician. He graduated from the Moscow University in 1887, and had a private practice in the same city. His speciality was in the fields of neurology, psychiatry and psychology. Dahl was interested in music and he was a competent amateur cellist.

Dahl is best known for treating the composer Sergei Rachmaninoff. Rachmaninoff had a nervous breakdown because of poor critical reviews of his Symphony No. 1 and went into a creative block. In January 1900 Dahl took Rachmaninoff into a treatment which lasted daily for more than three months, using hypnotherapy and psychotherapy. Dahl's treatment, helped by support from Rachmaninoff's own family and friends, cured the composer, who dedicated his Piano Concerto No. 2 (1901) to Dahl.

Dr. Dahl is said to have emigrated from Russia in 1925 and have died in 1939 in Beirut.

In program booklets from Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra in 1999 and 2001 Dahl is referred to as being Norwegian. This assertion was later disclaimed in an article in the Journal for Norwegian Medical Association.[1]