Nelly Akopian-Tamarina

Nelly Akopian-Tamarina is a Russian pianist.

Born in Moscow, she studied with Anaida Sumbatyan at the Moscow Central Music School. Later at the Moscow Conservatoire she was one of the last students of the legendary Alexander Borisovich Goldenweiser — associate and friend of Alexander Scriabin, Sergei Rachmaninoff and Nikolai Medtner — and the first student of Dmitri Bashkirov. Through her teachers she carries on this branch of the old Russian piano tradition, reaching back to Franz Liszt, Alexander Siloti, Felix Blumenfeld, and Anton Rubinstein.

As a student Akopian-Tamarina won the Gold Medal at the 1963 Robert Schumann International Competition for Pianists and Singers in Zwickau, and in 1974, succeeding Richter, Nikolayeva and Gilels, was awarded the Robert Schumann Prize. A former Soloist of the Moscow State Philharmonie, she appeared as a recitalist and with all the leading orchestras of the former U.S.S.R. and Eastern Bloc.

Her recordings for Melodiya — including Chopin's Preludes op.28, and the Schumann Piano Concerto with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra — are now collectors' items. During the 1970s, however, her career was blocked by official censorship, preventing her from giving public concerts for more than a decade. In the isolation of these years, she turned to painting for artistic self-expression, her watercolours being selected for exhibition in Moscow.

Akopian-Tamarina made her London debut at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in March 1983 (a programme of Schumann and Chopin) followed by engagements around the United Kingdom, the United States, and Europe including Amsterdam's Concertgebouw. Her first British recording, the Schumann Fantasy (Brilliant Classics, Legendary Russian Pianists, 2009), dates from this period.

...
Wikipedia