Pianist Nicholas Angelich Has Died, Aged 51

The American-born pianist Nicholas Angelich was born in Cincinnati in 1970 to two immigrant parents: his father, Borivoje Andjelitch, a violinist from Yugoslavia, and his Russian mother Clara Angelich (née Kadarjan) taught the piano. She was also her son's first teacher.

At age 7, after just two years of lessons, Angelich made his solo debut, playing Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 21. Once he was 13, the family moved to Paris to enable Angelich to attend France's Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique. There, he studied with Aldo Ciccolini, Yvonne Loriod, and Michel Béroff, winning many of the institution's awards.

At the conclusion of his study, Angelich won the Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition in 1994. By the end of 2003, he had made his New York recital debut, as well as his solo debut with the New York Philharmonic. He also received the Young Talent Award at Germany's Ruhr International Piano Festival from his mentor Leon Fleischer.

Angelich was a regular performer at the Verbier and Lugano festivals and spent a great deal of time collaborating with the Capuçon brothers, Renaud and Gautier. Together, they made recordings of the Brahms piano trios, piano quartets, and violin sonatas.

Though Angelich was known for his performances of all of the major nineteenth-century German composers, the music of Johannes Brahms remained a particular preoccupation throughout his life.

"When I was a young boy I heard a lot of Brahms's music played in the house," Angelich said in a 2010 interview. "So you could say that I owe my love for Brahms to my parents."

The cause of death was degenerative lung failure, according to Angelich's manager Stefana Atlas. He had undergone an operation for a lung transplant but passed away in Paris's Bichat-Claude Bernard Hospital after the new lung was rejected. Aged just 51, Angelich had already been suffering from lung disease for some time before his death.

"Nicholas Angelich was a man who radiated honesty and good nature," said Alain Lanceron, the President of Warner Classics and Erato.

"As a musician, he astonished with his command of his instrument, but there was a purity in his playing that illuminated the truth of the work in question, making him a true poet of the piano," Lanceron continued. "On a personal level, he was adored by his fellow musicians for his generosity and his collaborative spirit. It was through music that he expressed himself most completely and he opened up new, sometimes dazzling worlds for the listener."

You can hear Angelich performing "Träumerei" from Robert Schumann's Kinderszenen at the 2010 edition of the Verbier Festival below.