The Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No.1 was the first recording of

Van Cliburn Harvey Lavan "Van" Cliburn Jr. (; July 12, 1934February 27, 2013) was an American pianist who, at the age of 23, achieved worldwide recognition when he won the inaugural International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow in 1958 during the Cold Wa ...

in 1958 for

RCA Victor RCA Records is an American record label currently owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America. It is one of Sony Music's four flagship labels, alongside RCA's former long-time rival Columbia Records; also Aris ...

. It won Cliburn a

Grammy award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...

and was the first classical recording to go platinum, that is to sell more than a million copies.Lorenzo F. Candelaria, Daniel Kingman American Music: A Panorama 2011 p 268 "Van Cliburn's recording of Tchaikovsky's first piano concerto (on the RCA label) would become the first classical recording to sell more than a million copies, and in 1962 the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, held every four years in ..." The

RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra The RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra, sometimes also known as the Victor Symphony Orchestra, RCA Victor Salon Orchestra, the RCA Victor Orchestra and the RCA Orchestra, was an American studio orchestra founded in 1940 by the RCA Victor record label for ...

was conducted by

Kiril Kondrashin Kirill Petrovich Kondrashin (, ''Kirill Petrovič Kondrašin''; – 7 March 1981) was a Soviet and Russian conductor. People's Artist of the USSR (1972). Early life Kondrashin was born in Moscow to a family of orchestral musicians. Having spent ...

who at Cliburn's request had been given permission to leave the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

References

1950s classical albums Concertos by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky {{1950s-album-stub 1958 albums United States National Recording Registry recordings United States National Recording Registry albums