Nikolai Medtner

Nikolai Karlovich Medtner; 5 January 1880 [O.S. 24 December 1879] – 13 November 1951) was a Russian composer and pianist. After a period of comparative obscurity in the twenty-five years immediately after his death, he is now becoming recognized as one of the most significant Russian composers for the piano.

A younger contemporary of Sergei Rachmaninoff and Alexander Scriabin, he wrote a substantial number of compositions, all of which include the piano. His works include fourteen piano sonatas, three violin sonatas, three piano concerti, a piano quintet, two works for two pianos, many shorter piano pieces, a few shorter works for violin and piano, and 108 songs including two substantial works for vocalise. His 38 Skazki (generally known as "Fairy Tales" in English but more correctly translated as "Tales") for piano solo contain some of his most original music.

Nikolai Medtner was born in Moscow on 24 December 1879, according to the Julian calendar then in use in Russia. The Gregorian calendar, in use in the West at the time, and by which all dates are calculated today, gives his date of birth as 5 January 1880. He was the son of Karl Petrovich Medtner (1846-1921) and Alexandra Karlovna Goedicke (1843-1918); he was the fifth of their six children.

Medtner first took piano lessons from his mother until the age of ten. He also had lessons from his mother's brother Fyodor Goedicke (the father of his more famous cousin Alexander Goedicke). He then entered the Moscow Conservatory in 1891, and graduated nine years later in 1900 at the age of 20, receiving the Anton Rubinstein prize, having studied under Pavel Pabst, Wassily Sapellnikoff, Vasily Safonov and Sergei Taneyev among others. Despite his conservative musical tastes, Medtner's compositions and his pianism were highly regarded by his contemporaries.