Abbey Simon


Abbey Henry Simon was an American concert pianist, teacher, and recording artist. He was a protégé of Josef Hofmann at the Curtis Institute of Music and a winner of the Naumburg International Piano Competition in 1940. He was called a "supervirtuoso" by The New York Times.

Education

Simon began lessons with David Saperton at the age of five. At the age of eight, Simon was accepted by Josef Hofmann as a scholarship student at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where his classmates included Jorge Bolet and Sidney Foster. Simon also took lessons from Leopold Godowsky, Dora Zaslavsky, and Harold Bauer. Shortly after graduation, he debuted at the Town Hall and Carnegie Hall in New York City. He won the Naumburg International Piano Competition in 1940.

Career

Simon performed to critical acclaim. The critic Harold C. Schonberg of the New York Times once hailed Simon as a "supervirtuoso". Boston Globe critic Richard Dyer wrote, "Simon's recital offered more than a glimpse into the fabled golden age of piano playing...His virtuosity is marked not only by speed, power, lightness and accuracy but also by intricate interplay of voices and lambent colors."
Simon toured in Europe, the Middle East, and the Pacific. He appeared with the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Houston Symphony, and the Trenton Symphony Orchestra, among many others.
Simon gave master classes at the Royal Academy of Music in London, Royal Conservatory of The Hague, and the Geneva Conservatory. From 1960 to 1974, he was a faculty member at Indiana University, where he taught alongside his Curtis classmates Bolet and Foster. He also served on the faculties of the Manhattan School of Music, Hunter College, the Moores School of Music in Houston, and the Juilliard School of Music in New York City. His students include pianists Josef Verba, Eliza Garth, Frederic Chiu, Karen Shaw, John Kamitsuka, Erika Nickrenz, Richard Dowling, Elyane Laussade, Adrienne Park, Roger Wright, Garnet Ungar, Hsia-Jung Chang, Shelly Berg, Andrew Cooperstock, Daniel Glover, David Korevaar, Nancy Weems, David Westfall, Terence Yung and Martha Argerich.
In addition to performing, teaching, and recording as a musical artist, Abbey Simon served as a jury member of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, the Geneva International Music Competition, the Leeds International Piano Competition, the Clara Haskil International Piano Competition, the Sydney International Piano Competition, and the South Africa International Piano Competition.
Simon lived in Geneva, Switzerland. He maintained a home in Houston, Texas, where he was, from 1977 until his retirement in April 2019, Cullen Distinguished Professor of Music in the Moores School of Music in the University of Houston.
Simon died in Geneva on December 18, 2019, a few weeks prior to his 100th birthday.

Awards and honors

Abbey Simon recorded extensively on the VOX, Philips, and His Master's Voice labels. His discography includes the complete works of Frédéric Chopin and Maurice Ravel, major works of Johannes Brahms and Robert Schumann, and all of the piano concerti of Sergei Rachmaninoff with Leonard Slatkin and the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra.
  • Albeniz-Godowsky:
  • *Triana from "Iberia"
  • Beethoven:
  • *Quintet for piano and winds
  • Brahms:
  • *Concerto No. 1 in D-minor
  • *Variations on a theme by Paganini, Op. 35
  • *Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel, Op. 24 & Variations on a theme by Paganini
  • *Three pieces for piano solo
  • *F minor Sonata, Op. 5
  • *Intermezzi, Capriccios, Fantasies and Rhapsodies
  • Chopin:
  • *The Four Scherzi
  • *The Four Ballades, Impromptus, and Berceuse
  • *The Sonatas and Barcarolle
  • *Etudes, Op.10 & 25
  • *The Complete Waltzes, Fantasie & Variations Brillantes
  • *Nocturnes
  • *Preludes
  • *The Piano Concertos
  • *The Complete Orchestral Works
  • Dohnanyi:
  • *Variations on a Nursery Song
  • Franck:
  • *Prélude, Chorale and Fugue
  • Grieg:
  • *Piano Concerto in A minor, Op. 16
  • Liszt:
  • *Six Grandes Etudes de Paganini
  • *Etude in D-flat major
  • Mendelssohn:
  • *17 Variations Sérieuses
  • Rachmaninoff:
  • *The Complete Works for Piano & Orchestra
  • *Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No 3 in D minor, Op. 30
  • Ravel:
  • *Piano Concerto in G
  • *Piano Concerto in D for the Left Hand
  • *Complete Works for Piano Solo
  • Saint-Saëns:
  • *Le Carnaval des Animaux
  • Schumann:
  • *Variations on the name ABEGG, Kreisleriana, Arabesque, Kinderscenen
  • *Carnaval, Op. 9 & Fantasy in C, Op. 17
  • Transcriptions:
  • *by Liszt, Rachmaninoff, Godowsky, Chasins