Ray Lev

Ray Lev (May 8, 1912 – May 20, 1968) was an American classical pianist. One year after her birth in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, her father, a synagogue cantor, and mother, a concert singer, brought her to the United States.

Lev’s early piano studies were with Waiter Ruel Cowles in New Haven, Connecticut and Gaston Déthier in New York. She made her debut at age 17 in England performing Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 under Sir Landon Ronald. After winning the American Matthay Prize and the Philharmonic Symphony Scholarship, she studied with Tobias Matthay in England from 1930 to 1933. Thereafter, Lev returned to the United States, where she made her New York debut in 1934 with the National Orchestral Association. Her annual recitals in Carnegie Hall were generally sold out; she also toured successfully in Europe, the United States, and Canada and performed on radio network broadcasts. In one such Carnegie Hall recital, on November 10, 1944, Lev gave the first complete traversal ever presented in that venue of the Six Pieces, op. 118 of Johannes Brahms. Lev also was a champion of modern works. For instance, in November 1945, again at Carnegie Hall, she gave the premiere of Louise Talma's Alleluia in Form of a Toccata and of 24-year-old Douglas Townsend's Sonatina No. 1, which she repeated in a March 31, 1946 recital at New York Times Hall broadcast live over WNYC. A November 1948 Carnegie Hall recital included the Hora movement from the 1937 Chassidic Suite of Jakob Schönberg.

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