Igor Kipnis

Igor Kipnis, the child of the fantastic Russian bass singer Alexander Kipnis (1891-1978), was for a few years America’s leading harpsichord and fortepiano participant. Unsurprisingly, he was subjected to music from his first days. His dad was singing using the Berlin Opera when Igor was created. For another eight years the family members mostly transferred about European countries, wherever Alexander’s profession took them. The Kipnis family members moved to america in 1938 when Alexander became a member of the roster from the Metropolitan Opera. Igor’s mother’s aspect of the family members can be musical. His grandfather Heniot Levy was the top from the piano section on the American Conservatory in Chicago, and provided Igor a few of his early key pad lessons. A lot of the music inside your home originated from his father’s 78 rpm record participant and a thorough assortment of lieder and opera aria disks. Igor himself got the record collecting insect and made a decision to purchase Edwin Fischer’s well-known recording of the entire Well-Tempered Clavier by Bach, a couple of five albums, priced at 90 dollars. Although this is an astronomical amount for the guy in the 1940s, Igor proved helpful to earn the amount of money, then discovered that the final volume included two even more 78s being a filler. These provided the English Collection No. 2 performed on harpsichord by Wanda Landowska. The sound from the device fascinated him. Nevertheless, Igor had small thought of learning to be a musician, although he previously developed fine key pad abilities. He majored in public relationships at Harvard and wished to function in radio or Television creation or the record sector. He finally acquired an opportunity to play a harpsichord when going for a training course on Handel with composer Randall Thompson. “Nothing at all happened, nevertheless, until 1957,” he composed, “when my parents brought in a small device for me personally to fool around with after function.” At that time he oversaw cover style and wrote plan records for Westminster Information, having briefly proved helpful at WMCA, New York’s Best 40 radio train station, as record librarian, and was composing evaluations for the American Record Guidebook. Meanwhile, he previously researched harpsichord with Thurston Dart. He debuted like a freelance harpsichord participant, furthermore to his additional careers, in 1959, mainly playing harpsichord continuo, including some recordings of Baroque trumpet music with Richard Kapp. Out of this a significant international saving and touring profession grew. He documented over 81 albums, including around 60 single discs. He trained and played in the Berkshire Music Middle at Tanglewood (1964-1967), Fairfield School in Connecticut (1971-1977), as well as the Celebration Music Culture in Indianapolis. He added the fortepiano (precursor from the piano) to his equipment, making his initial appearance playing it in Indianapolis. He was involved with radio being a regular guest over the syndicated record review plan “First Hearing” as well as for 3 years hosted his very own WQXR radio plan, “Age Baroque” and a syndicated series, “The Classical Body organ.” He released many editions of Baroque key pad music, and loves writing record testimonials for leading American magazines. His harpsichord repertoire included a massive level of Baroque- and Classical-era music, but also a copious quantity from the music for harpsichord that is written because the revival from the device in the 1920s. This included functions by Falla, Rochberg, Rorem, McCabe, Curtis-Smith, Locklair, Kolb, Salzman, and Richard Rodney Bennett. In 1995, he produced the Kipnis-Kushner Piano Duo with Karen Kushner, which toured internationally.