Daniell Revenaugh (May 30, 1934 – March 12, 2021) was an American classical pianist and conductor.

Career

Revenaugh was born in

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border ...

. He made his debut at the age of 14 playing

Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classic ...

's First Piano Concerto with the

Louisville Orchestra The Louisville Orchestra is the primary orchestra in Louisville, Kentucky. It was founded in 1937 by Robert Whitney (1904–1986) and Charles Farnsley, Mayor of Louisville. The Louisville Orchestra employs salaried musicians, and offers a wide ...

. He studied with Ferruccio Busoni's pupil

Egon Petri Egon Petri (23 March 188127 May 1962) was a Dutch pianist. Life and career Petri's family was Dutch. He was born a Dutch citizen but in Hanover, Germany, and grew up in Dresden, where he attended the Kreuzschule. His father, a professional vio ...

from 1951 until Petri's death in 1962. In 1959 he graduated from Florida State University, where he studied with

Ernst von Dohnányi Ernst von Dohnányi (Hungarian: ''Dohnányi Ernő'', ; 27 July 1877 – 9 February 1960) was a Hungarian composer, pianist and conductor. He used a German form of his name on most published compositions. Biography Dohnányi was born in Pozsony ...

and Lewis Pankaskie. He later founded the Busoni Society with

Rudolph Ganz Rudolph Ganz (24 February 1877 – 2 August 1972) was a Swiss-born American pianist, conductor, composer, and music educator. Career Early career as a pianist and conductor Born in Zurich, Ganz studied cello with Friedrich Hegar and piano w ...

and

Gunnar Johansen Gunnar Johansen (January 21, 1906, Copenhagen – May 25, 1991, Blue Mounds, Wisconsin) was a Danish-born pianist and composer. He was one of the chief proponents of the music of Ferruccio Busoni, whose mature keyboard works he recorded in their ...

, and has amassed a large and important collection of Busoni and Petri materials. In 1973 Revenaugh became the first General Director of the Institute For Advanced Music Study in

Crans-Montana Crans-Montana is a municipality in the district of Sierre in the canton of Valais, Switzerland. On 1 January 2017 the former municipalities of Chermignon, Mollens, Montana and Randogne merged to form the new municipality of Crans-Montana. ...

, Switzerland, a full scholarship international programme with faculty which included

Zino Francescatti René-Charles "Zino" Francescatti (August 9, 1902 – September 17, 1991) was a French virtuoso violinist. Zino Francescatti was born in Marseilles, to a musical family. Both parents were violinists. His father, who also played the cello, had stu ...

Gregor Piatigorsky Gregor Piatigorsky (, ''Grigoriy Pavlovich Pyatigorskiy''; August 6, 1976) was a Russian Empire-born American cellist. Biography Early life Gregor Piatigorsky was born in Ekaterinoslav (now Dnipro, Ukraine) into a Jewish family. As a child, he ...

, Ib Lanzky-Otto and

Rudolf Kempe Rudolf Kempe (14 June 1910 – 12 May 1976) was a German conductor. Biography Kempe was born in Dresden, where from the age of fourteen he studied at the Dresden State Opera School. He played oboe in the opera orchestra of Dortmund and ...

. Daniell Revenaugh invented and patented a lower lid for the grand piano, which projects the sound more effectively. It has been used in concert by pianists such as

Martha Argerich Martha Argerich (; Eastern Catalan: �ɾʒəˈɾik born 5 June 1941) is an Argentine classical concert pianist. She is widely considered to be one of the greatest pianists of all time. Early life and education Argerich was born in Buenos A ...

Peter Serkin Peter Adolf Serkin (July 24, 1947 – February 1, 2020) was an American classical pianist. He won the Grammy Award for Most Promising New Classical Recording Artist in 1966, and he performed globally, known for not only "technically pristine" pl ...

André Watts André Watts (born June 20, 1946) is an American classical pianist and professor at the Jacobs School of Music of Indiana University. In 2020, he was elected to the American Philosophical Society. Life and early performances Born in Nurember ...

Radu Lupu Radu Lupu (30 November 1945 – 17 April 2022) was a Romanian pianist. He was widely recognized as one of the greatest pianists of his time. Born in Galați, Romania, Lupu began studying piano at the age of six. Two of his major piano teach ...

and

Alexander Toradze Alexander Davidovich "Lexo" Toradze ( ka, ალექსანდრე თორაძე ''Aleksandre Toradze''; May 30, 1952 – May 11, 2022) was a Georgian-born American pianist, best known for his classical Russian repertoire, with a car ...

. He also patented a muting device for grand pianos, which protects downstairs neighbors. Revenaugh created the Electric Symphony Orchestra. In the 1980s he created the Classical Cabaret, which performed solo and chamber works to the accompaniment of jugglers, paddle balls, yo-yos, Indian clubs and fire eaters. He was involved in a project to convert opera composer

Carlisle Floyd Carlisle Sessions Floyd (June 11, 1926September 30, 2021) was an American composer primarily known for his operas. These stage works, for which he wrote the librettos, typically engage with themes from the American South, particularly the Post ...

's former home in

Tallahassee, Florida Tallahassee ( ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat and only incorporated municipality in Leon County. Tallahassee became the capital of Florida, then the Florida Territory, in 1824. In 2020, the populatio ...

into an artist's residence. He had four children and three grandchildren and had homes in Berkeley, California; Tallahassee, Florida; and Lausanne, Switzerland. Revenaugh owned many pianos, among which was the 1840 Érard upon which Franz Liszt played the first solo piano recital. The Erard is autographed by Liszt himself. In 2008 Revenaugh made a DVD of Carlisle Floyd's Piano Sonata, which included an hour of coaching by Floyd himself.

Revenaugh's musical activities in the San Francisco Bay area

* Performance of the Dohnányi Piano Concerto No. 2 with George Cleve and the San Jose Symphony in 1977, marking the centenary of

's birth (27 July 1877). * Initiated an all

Darius Milhaud Darius Milhaud (; 4 September 1892 – 22 June 1974) was a French composer, conductor, and teacher. He was a member of Les Six—also known as ''The Group of Six''—and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century. His compositions ...

concert at Mills College in 1992, celebrating Milhaud's centenary (4 September 1892). As a graduate student Revenaugh studied at Mills College with Milhaud. * A series of the complete

Schubert Franz Peter Schubert (; 31 January 179719 November 1828) was an Austrian composer of the late Classical and early Romantic eras. Despite his short lifetime, Schubert left behind a vast ''oeuvre'', including more than 600 secular vocal wor ...

piano sonatas at the Julia Morgan Theater in Berkeley, honoring Schubert's bicentenary (1797). Each of the five concerts contained one early, one late and two middle period sonatas (20 in all).

Recordings

* In 1967 Revenaugh recorded the Busoni Piano Concerto with John Ogdon (piano), the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the

John Alldis Choir John Alldis (10 August 192920 December 2010) was an English chorus-master and conductor. Biography Alldis was educated at King's College School, Cambridge and Felsted. He then returned to King's College, Cambridge as a choral scholar under Bo ...

at Abbey Road studios for EMI. This recording won the Deutscher Schallplatten Preis, the Montreux Award, a Grammy nomination and has remained in the EMI catalogue for 51 years. It was coupled with Busoni's Two Studies from his opera ''

Doktor Faust ''Doktor Faust'' is an opera by Ferruccio Busoni with a German libretto by the composer, based on the myth of Faust. Busoni worked on the opera, which he intended as his masterpiece, between 1916 and 1924, but it was still incomplete at the time o ...

'': "Sarabande and Cortege", Op. 51. * an EMI disc of "Popular Piano Classics", containing popular works by thirteen famous composers.ArkivMusic
/ref> * the complete music for 2 pianos by Busoni, with

Lawrence Leighton Smith Lawrence Leighton Smith (April 8, 1936 - October 25, 2013), was an American conductor and pianist. Smith was born in Portland, Oregon. He studied piano with Ariel Rubstein in Portland and Leonard Shure in New York. He earned bachelor's degrees fr ...

(EMI). * the premiere recording in 2009 of the Piano Sonata of

, America's best known opera composer. He composed it in the 1950s for

Rudolf Firkušný Rudolf Firkušný (; 11 February 191219 July 1994) was a Moravian-born, Moravian-American classical pianist. Life Born in Moravian town Napajedla, Firkušný started his musical studies with the composers Leoš Janáček and Josef Suk, and ...

, who played it at a Carnegie Hall recital. Floyd coached Revenaugh on the Sonata for an hour. Revenaugh then recorded it one take - both of which are captured on a DVD available at Arkiv Musik and CD Baby.

References

External links

BUSONI AT CARNEGIE HALL Daniell Revenaugh, Busoni scholar and performer, is interviewed by John Whiting, with excerpts from interviews
with

Philipp Jarnach Philipp Jarnach (26 July 1892 17 December 1982 in Börnsen) was a German composer of modern music ("Neue Musik"), pianist, teacher, and conductor. Jarnach was born in Noisy-le-Sec, France, the son of a Spanish sculptor and a Flemish mother. Besi ...

and Benvenuto Busoni. 8 December 1965 {{DEFAULTSORT:Revenaugh, Daniell 1934 births 2021 deaths American male conductors (music) American classical pianists American male pianists 20th-century American inventors Florida State University alumni 20th-century American pianists 20th-century American conductors (music) 21st-century American conductors (music) 21st-century classical pianists 20th-century American male musicians 21st-century American male musicians 21st-century American pianists People from Louisville, Kentucky