![]() ![]() During his Harvard years Bernstein met an important mentor in Dimitri Mitropouls, who was influential in Bernstein’s path to becoming a conductor. After high school he entered Harvard University, where music study was intellectually stimulating but not focused on performance. Even so, Bernstein was not at a level to become a concert pianist as a teen. In a significant step as a pianist Bernstein played the first movement of the Grieg Piano Concerto on May 14, 1934, with the Boston Public Schools Symphony Orchestra. ![]() He made significant technical progress with her, adding discipline to his natural talent, and continued discovering vast amounts of literature. In 1932 Bernstein began piano study with Helen Coates, a life-changing teacher and the first to recognise his potential. His musical enthusiasms were broad and eclectic, even at a young age, but particular favourites were Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue and Ravel’s Bolero, for which he discovered a piano solo arrangement. The boy had discovered orchestral music and opera by now and delighted in playing piano transcriptions. For his bar Mitzvah in 1931 Bernstein’s father gave him a five-foot grand piano. He had long been improvising at the piano and began more organised composition about the age of 12, and attempted to write no less than a piano concerto, which was left unfinished. He was usually the centre of attention at parties. The piano, combined with his exuberant personality, became Bernstein’s social calling card. His father balked at the fee of three dollars a lesson, so the young Bernstein began earning money himself by teaching piano to neighbourhood children and playing popular music in a wedding band with friends. 1955īy the age of 13 Bernstein was studying in the preparatory department at the New England Conservatory of Music and playing Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsodies, which he adored. Leonard Bernstein, seated at piano, making annotations to musical score. He was captivated by classical repertoire but his fascination with popular song continued. Lessons soon followed and Bernstein made quick progress, playing Bach Preludes, Chopin Preludes and Nocturnes in his second year of piano study. As a boy Bernstein’s principal musical influences were the local synagogue and popular songs on the radio, which he began to play by ear as soon as the piano arrived. ![]() There was no piano in his family home until he was ten years old, when an aunt’s upright was given to the Bernstein family of Roxbury, Massachusetts. As his principal instrument, the piano was inextricably a part of Leonard Bernstein’s musical life. ![]()
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