Sorry, Delete this thread!

[chopinguy]

Hi everyone,

Actually, this forum is the first place where I've ever heard of a composer named Rach in my whole life... who was he?  (Sorry if I'm somehow repeating a thread somewhere, if I am, just post a link to it)

EDIT: Ahhh sorry, the computer was slow and i pressed send twice, and it posted twice.

[Etude]

this forum is the first place where I've ever heard of a composer named Rach in my whole life... who was he?

 

You never heard of Rach!

He was one of the great Russian composers of the first half of the 20th century.  His full name is actually Сергей Васильевич Рахманинов which in English is Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninov.  This has been affectionately shortened to "Rach" by members of the piano forum and by many others. He lived from 1st April 1873, to 28th March 1943.  Though he lived in the modern era while composers such as Prokofiev and Hindemith were composing works of increasing modernism and atonality, Rachmaninov wrote in his own, individual style, similar to 19th Century Romanticism.  Only towards the very end of his life did he move on to more modern styles such as in his fouth piano concerto, or the Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini.  His most well known work is the famous C sharp minor prelude op. 3 no. 2 which Rachmaninov came to nickname 'it.'  This was because at every recital he was always forced to play 'it.'  Second is his second piano concerto which is the second most recorded piano concerto in the world, with Tchaikowsky's Piano concerto at first.  One of his most important and complex works is the third piano concerto, which is arguably one of the most technically difficult concertos ever written, nicknamed by many the 'Rach 3'.  We are very fortunate that Rachmaninov was able to make recordings of his own performances, because it is a tremendous shame that we can't hear more of the great composers playing, (the first was Brahms I think, but the quality is terrible.)

HTH

Etude_de_Concert 

[chopinguy]

Oh, I saw the other thread where pi posted, and I still feel like kicking myself for not realizing that Rach was short for Rachmaninoff!