Victor Merzhanov

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Victor Merzhanov at Moscow Conservatory (August 2007)

Victor Karpovich Merzhanov (Russian: Ви́ктор Ка́рпович Мержа́нов) (b. August 15, 1919, Tambov) is a Russian pianist.

[edit] Biography

Studied at Tambov Musical College with Solomon Starikov and Alexander Poltoratsky. Between 1936-1941 he studied at the Moscow Conservatory in the classes of Samuil Feinberg (piano) and Alexander Goedicke (organ), graduating with distinction.

He achieved international recognition as a pianist in 1945 when he won the first prize (shared with Sviatoslav Richter) at the Third All-Soviet-Union Piano Competition. In 1949, he was a placed sixth at the Chopin Competition in Warsaw. His name is inscribed on the Moscow Conservatory's marble wall along with those of Scriabin and Rachmaninov. Merzhanov became a Moscow Philharmony soloist in 1946.

Merzhanov has been a Professor at the Moscow Conservatory since 1947. Among his students are prize-winners of international competitions: Vladimir Bunin, Oleg Volkov, Igor Girfanov, Yuri Didenko, Mikhail Olenev, Hideyo Harada, Nazzareno Carusi, Tatiana Shebanova, Ruslan Sviridov, Irina Khovanskaya, Anna Yarovaya, Anahit Nersesyan and many others.

During his 60-year stage career, Merzhanov gave more than 2000 recitals and concerts in Russia, Europe, the USA, China, and other countries, with such conductors as Lorin Maazel, Kurt Sanderling, Kiril Kondrashin, Aleksandr Gauk, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, Yuri Temirkanov, and Evgeny Svetlanov.

His recordings (on major labels in the USA, Italy, Japan and the USSR) show his repertoire, including works from the Baroque period to contemporary music, from works by Bach and Beethoven to those by Prokofiev and Shostakovich.

From the start of his career he championed modern music, and was chosen by Prokofiev to give the first performance of his Sixth Sonata. Today a Professor at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory and Tambov Rachmaninov Institute, Merzhanov sits as as a jury member in more than 40 international competitions including the Rachmaninov Competition (which he has founded) and Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, the Chopin Competition in Warsaw, the Bartok-Liszt Competition in Budapest, and international competitions in Montreal, Tokyo, Brussels and others. In addition, Merzhanov is the artistic director of the Rachmaninov Piano Courses, and has contributed greatly to the Rachmaninov Museum in Ivanovka near Tambov.