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On May 23, 2023, we commemorate the centennial of legendary Spanish pianist Alicia de Larrocha (1923–2009). Over the course of four decades, she was a frequent soloist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in Orchestra Hall, the Ravinia Festival, in Carnegie Hall, and in Milwaukee. As a recitalist, she regularly appeared under the auspices of Allied Arts and Symphony Center Presents between 1967 and 2001.
De Larrocha’s auspicious CSO and Carnegie Hall debuts occurred on November 8, 1966, when she performed one of her signature works, Falla’s Nights in the Gardens of Spain under the baton of seventh music director Jean Martinon. “Miss de Larrocha is a marvel. Her playing has perfect finish, complete authority, and rhythmic suppleness,” wrote Harold C. Schonberg in the New York Times. “As a Spaniard, she brings special authority to the Falla work, that curious and attractive hybrid of Spanish feeling and French technique. . . . She is a wonderful pianist and more: she is an artist.”
“The diminutive pianist from Barcelona may be the youngest seventy-six-year-old virtuoso before the public,” according to John von Rhein in the Chicago Tribune, following de Larrocha’s July 10, 1999, appearance with the Orchestra at the Ravinia Festival. “Her splendidly even fingering, rounded tone, pearly legato runs, and springy rhythmic articulations made her an ideal interpreter for Mozart’s sunny Piano Concerto no. 19 in F, K. 459. Everything was in the best of taste, nothing was overdone or excessively manicured, making this perfect midsummer Mozart.”
A complete list of Alicia de Larrocha’s appearances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is below.
November 8, 1966, Carnegie Hall
FALLA Nights in the Gardens of Spain
Jean Martinon, conductor
November 26, 1966, Orchestra Hall
MONTSALVATGE Concerto breve
Irwin Hoffman, conductor
October 3 and 4, 1968, Orchestra Hall
SCHUMANN Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54
István Kertész, conductor
August 11, 1973, Ravinia Festival
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 27 in B-flat Major, K. 595
Lawrence Foster, conductor
April 29, 30, and May 1, 1976, Orchestra Hall
May 12, 1976, Carnegie Hall
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 27 in B-flat Major, K. 595
Sir Georg Solti, conductor
July 8, 1976, Ravinia Festival
RAVEL Piano Concerto in G Major
RAVEL Piano Concerto for the Left Hand in D Major
James Levine, conductor
August 10, 1978, Ravinia Festival
CHOPIN Piano Concerto No. 2 in F Minor, Op. 21
James Conlon, conductor
December 13, 14, 15, and 16, 1978, Orchestra Hall
December 18, 1978, Uihlein Hall, Milwaukee
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 25 in C Major, K. 503
Sir Georg Solti, conductor
July 10, 1981, Ravinia Festival
RAVEL Piano Concerto in G Major
James Levine, conductor
October 15, 16, 17, and 1981, Orchestra Hall
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 22 in E-flat Major, K. 482
FALLA Nights in the Gardens of Spain
Garcia Navarro, conductor
July 30, 1983, Ravinia Festival
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 1 in C Major, Op. 15
FALLA Nights in the Gardens of Spain
Jesús López-Cobos, conductor
August 10, 1985, Ravinia Festival
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37
Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor
December 5, 6, and 7, 1985, Orchestra Hall
RAVEL Piano Concerto in G Major
Erich Leinsdorf, conductor
July 12, 1986, Ravinia Festival
SCHUMANN Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54
James Levine, conductor
July 16, 1988, Ravinia Festival
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 9 in E-flat Major, K. 271 (Jeunehomme)
Dennis Russell Davies, conductor
August 10, 1989, Ravinia Festival
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 1 in C Major, Op. 15
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 2 B-flat Major, Op. 19
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3, C Minor, Opus 37
Edo de Waart, conductor
August 12, 1989, Ravinia Festival
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat Major, Op. 73 (Emperor)
Edo de Waart, conductor
October 12, 13, and 14, 1989, Orchestra Hall
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 21 in C Major, K. 467
FALLA Nights in the Gardens of Spain
David Zinman, conductor
July 28, 1990, Ravinia Festival
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 25 in C Major, K. 503
Gianluigi Gelmetti, conductor
August 2, 1991, Ravinia Festival
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 24 in C Minor, K. 491
Marek Janowski, conductor
July 18, 1992, Ravinia Festival
SCHUMANN Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54
James Conlon, conductor
July 17, 1994, Ravinia Festival
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58
Semyon Bychkov, conductor
July 22, 1995, Ravinia Festival
RAVEL Piano Concerto in G Major
Riccardo Chailly, conductor
February 29, March 1, 2, 3, and 5, 1996, Orchestra Hall
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major, K. 488
Daniele Gatti, conductor
August 2, 1996, Ravinia Festival
FALLA Nights in the Garden of Spain
Christoph Eschenbach, conductor
July 10, 1999, Ravinia Festival
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 19 in F Major, K. 459
Semyon Bychkov, conductor
This article also appears here.
The Chicago Symphony Orchestra family wishes the legendary American pianist Byron Janis a very happy ninety-fifth birthday!
Janis made his professional debut at the age of fifteen in 1943, performing Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto with the NBC Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Arturo Toscanini. The following year, he was chosen by Vladimir Horowitz as his first student, and at eighteen, he became the youngest artist signed to a contract by RCA Victor Records. On October 29, 1948, Janis made his Carnegie Hall debut, and Olin Downes in the New York Times wrote, “Not for a long time had this writer heard such a talent allied with the musicianship, the feeling, the intelligence and artistic balance shown by the twenty-year-old pianist, Byron Janis. . . . Whatever he touched he made significant and fascinating by the most legitimate and expressive means.”
On March 4, 1954, Janis made his debut with the Chicago Symphony in Orchestra Hall. “Mr. Janis played a performance of the Tchaikovsky concerto uncommonly beautiful for what it was, and uncommonly exciting for what it can be. . . . If you have it, you have it, and Mr. Janis does,” wrote Claudia Cassidy in the Chicago Tribune. “He has temperament and fire and he wants, perhaps more than anything in the world, to play the piano. You can always tell that by the sound. It comes out in the explosions of the double octaves, in the instinctive sensing of the crest of a phrase . . . his Tchaikovsky was big, beautiful and dynamic, yet with all its tensions it sensed the relaxed sweep of the grand style. . . . Reiner and the Orchestra gave superb collaboration, part Russian song, part Russian bear.”
For more than twenty years, Byron Janis was a regular visitor, as soloist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and as a recitalist in Orchestra Hall. A complete list of his appearances is below.
July 10, 1952, Ravinia Festival
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37
Dimitri Mitropoulos, conductor
March 4 and 5, 1954, Orchestra Hall
TCHAIKOVSKY Piano Concerto in B-flat Minor, Op. 23
Fritz Reiner, conductor
July 27, 1956, Ravinia Festival
BERNSTEIN Symphony No. 2 (The Age of Anxiety)
Leonard Bernstein, conductor
December 6 and 7, 1956, Civic Opera House
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp Minor, Op. 1
STRAUSS Burlesque for Piano and Orchestra in D Minor
Fritz Reiner, conductor
August 2, 1957, Ravinia Festival
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30
William Steinberg, conductor
August 3, 1957, Ravinia Festival
TCHAIKOVSKY Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor, Op. 23
William Steinberg, conductor
January 20, 1958, Pabst Theatre, Milwaukee
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37
Carlo Maria Giulini, conductor
July 17, 1958, Ravinia Festival
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp Minor, Op. 1
Walter Hendl, conductor
July 22, 1958, Ravinia Festival
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37
Igor Markevitch, conductor
February 19 and 20, 1959, Orchestra Hall
SCHUMANN Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54
Fritz Reiner, conductor
February 24, 1959, Orchestra Hall
LISZT Totentanz for Piano and Orchestra
Fritz Reiner, conductor
March 23, 1959, Pabst Theatre, Milwaukee
SCHUMANN Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54
Fritz Reiner, conductor
July 9, 1959, Ravinia Festival
TCHAIKOVSKY Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor, Op. 23
Walter Hendl, conductor
July 11, 1959, Ravinia Festival
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30
Walter Hendl, conductor
February 4 and 5, 1960, Orchestra Hall
LISZT Piano Concerto No. 1 in E-flat Major
Fritz Reiner, conductor
February 9, 1960, Orchestra Hall
LISZT Concerto for Piano No. 2 in A Major
Fritz Reiner, conductor
July 5, 1960, Ravinia Festival
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 2 in C Minor, Op. 18
Walter Hendl, conductor
July 7, 1960, Ravinia Festival
SCHUMANN Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54
Walter Hendl, conductor
July 20, 1961, Ravinia Festival
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp Minor, Op. 1
Joseph Rosenstock, conductor
July 22, 1961, Ravinia Festival
LISZT Piano Concerto No. 1 in E-flat Major
Joseph Rosenstock, conductor
January 4 and 5, 1962, Orchestra Hall
TCHAIKOVSKY Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor, Op. 23
Leopold Stokowski, conductor
August 4, 1962, Ravinia Festival
LISZT Concerto for Piano No. 2 in A Major
RACHMANINOV Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 43
André Cluytens, conductor
November 1, 2, and 3, 1962, Orchestra Hall
November 4, 1962, Edgewater Beach Hotel (WGN Great Music from Chicago television broadcast)
November 5, 1962, Pabst Theatre, Milwaukee
PROKOFIEV Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Major, Op. 26
Hans Rosbaud, conductor
July 11, 1963, Ravinia Festival
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30
Walter Hendl, conductor
July 16, 1963, Ravinia Festival
GRIEG Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 16
Seiji Ozawa, conductor
November 21 and 22, 1963, Orchestra Hall
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 2 in C Minor, Op. 18
Jean Martinon, conductor
December 31, 1964, January 1 and 2, 1965, Orchestra Hall
January 4, 1965, Pabst Theatre, Milwaukee
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major, K. 488
Willem van Otterloo, conductor
July 26, 1966, Ravinia Festival
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp Minor, Op. 1
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 2 in C Minor, Op. 18
Seiji Ozawa, conductor
July 28, 1966, Ravinia Festival
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30
RACHMANINOV Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 43
Seiji Ozawa, conductor
April 20 and 21, 1967, Orchestra Hall
PROKOFIEV Piano Concerto No. 1 in D-flat Major, Op. 10
STRAUSS Burlesque for Piano and Orchestra in D Minor
Irwin Hoffman, conductor
June 27, 1967, Ravinia Festival
PROKOFIEV Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Major, Op. 26
Seiji Ozawa, conductor
June 29, 1967, Ravinia Festival
GERSHWIN Concerto in F for Piano and Orchestra
Seiji Ozawa, conductor
June 29, 1968, Ravinia Festival
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37
Seiji Ozawa, conductor
July 6, 1971, Ravinia Festival
STRAUSS Burlesque for Piano and Orchestra in D Minor
LISZT Piano Concerto No. 1 in E-flat Major
Lawrence Foster, conductor
June 29, 1973, Ravinia Festival
PROKOFIEV Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Major, Op. 26
James Levine, conductor
August 15, 1974, Ravinia Festival
SAINT-SAËNS Piano Concerto No. 5 in F Major, Op. 103 (Egyptian)
David Zinman, conductor
Janis also made several recordings with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, as follows:
LISZT Totentanz for Piano and Orchestra
Fritz Reiner, conductor
Recorded in Orchestra Hall on February 23, 1959, for RCA
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp Minor, Op. 1
Fritz Reiner, conductor
Recorded in Orchestra Hall on March 2, 1957, for RCA
SCHUMANN Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54
Fritz Reiner, conductor
Recorded in Orchestra Hall on February 21, 1959, for RCA
STRAUSS Burlesque for Piano and Orchestra in D Minor
Fritz Reiner, conductor
Recorded in Orchestra Hall on March 4, 1957, for RCA
Under the auspices of Allied Arts, Janis has appeared as piano recitalist on several occasions, as follows:
March 25, 1956
March 15, 1958
April 9, 1961
April 29, 1962
January 16, 1966
January 29, 1967
December 1, 1968
May 5, 1974
December 16, 1975
February 8, 1976
Happy, happy birthday!
This article also appears here.
The Chicago Symphony Orchestra family joins the classical music world in mourning the loss of Christopher Rouse. He died on September 21, 2019, at the age of seventy at a hospice center in Towson, Maryland.
Music by the Pulitzer Prize–winning composer has been performed by the Orchestra on numerous occasions, and a complete list is below.
March 1, 2, and 3, 1984, Orchestra Hall
ROUSE The Infernal Machine
Leonard Slatkin, conductor
April 28, 29, and 30, 1994, Orchestra Hall
ROUSE Symphony No. 1
David Zinman, conductor
June 29, 1995, Ravinia Festival
ROUSE Phaethon
Christoph Eschenbach, conductor
July 18, 1996, Ravinia Festival
ROUSE Symphony No. 2
Christoph Eschenbach, conductor
August 12, 1999, Ravinia Festival
ROUSE Envoi
Christoph Eschenbach, conductor
May 17, 18, 19, and 22, 2001, Orchestra Hall
ROUSE Clarinet Concerto
Larry Combs, clarinet
Christoph Eschenbach, conductor
The Clarinet Concerto was commissioned by the Hanson Institute for American Music of the Eastman School of Music (University of Rochester) and for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and its principal clarinet, Larry Combs. The concerto was dedicated to Augusta Read Thomas, the Orchestra’s composer-in-residence from 1997 until 2006.
April 20, 21, 22, 23, and 25, 2006, Orchestra Hall
ROUSE Rapture
David Zinman, conductor
December 20, 21, and 22, 2012, Orchestra Hall
ROUSE Heimdall’s Trumpet
Christopher Martin, trumpet
Jaap van Zweden, conductor
Heimdall’s Trumpet was commissioned for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra by the Edward F. Schmidt Family Commissioning Fund.
Numerous tributes have been posted on Chicago Classical Review, The Washington Post, Baltimore Sun, and Classic FM, among many others.
Christopher Rouse’s final work—his Symphony no. 6—will receive its world premiere on October 18, 2019, with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. Louis Langrée will conduct.
Sending happy ninetieth birthday wishes to the legendary pianist Byron Janis!
Between 1952 and 1974, Janis appeared with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on numerous occasions at Orchestra Hall, in Milwaukee, and at the Ravinia Festival, under the batons of music directors Fritz Reiner and Jean Martinon; associate conductors Walter Hendl and Irwin Hoffman; Ravinia Festival music directors Seiji Ozawa and James Levine; and guest conductors Leonard Bernstein, André Cluytens, Igor Markevitch, Dimitri Mitropoulos, Hans Rosbaud, Joseph Rosenstock, William Steinberg, Leopold Stokowski, Willem Van Otterloo, and David Zinman.
Janis made his debut with the Orchestra at the Ravinia Festival on July 10, 1952, in Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto with Dimitri Mitropoulos conducting.
Two years later—a few weeks shy of his twenty-sixth birthday—he first performed in Orchestra Hall on March 4 and 5, 1954, in Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto with Fritz Reiner on the podium. “If you have it, you have it, and Mr. Janis does,” wrote Claudia Cassidy in the Chicago Tribune following his debut. “He has good fingers, a direct approach, and a good tone. He has temperament and fire and he wants, perhaps more than anything else in the world, to play the piano. You can always tell that by the sound. It comes out in the explosions of the double octaves, in the instinctive sensing of the crest of a phrase, in the way a Russian song suddenly knows pain, which is not quite the same thing as being sad. Because of these things, because he is such a pianist, his Tchaikovsky was big, beautiful, and dynamic, yet with all its tensions it sensed the relaxed sweep of the grand style. Few things could be more stupid than to patronize such playing, which Reiner and the orchestra gave superb collaboration, part Russian song, part Russian bear. When I look forward to what that playing can be, I am speaking of it in Janis’s own terms. Give him time to strengthen those fingers, to deepen and polish that tone. But listen as he does it, for he is worth hearing now.”
He most recently appeared with the CSO in Orchestra Hall on April 20 and 21, 1967, in Prokofiev’s First Piano Concerto and Strauss’s Burleske with Irwin Hoffman conducting, and at the Ravinia Festival on August 15, 1974, in Saint-Saëns’s Fifth Piano Concerto under the baton of David Zinman.
Janis also made several recordings with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, as follows:
RACHMANINOV Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp Minor, Op. 1
Fritz Reiner, conductor
Recorded March 2, 1957, in Orchestra Hall by RCA

Byron Janis’s complete RCA catalog—including his recordings with the CSO—recently was re-released in a box set.
STRAUSS Burleske for Piano and Orchestra
Fritz Reiner, conductor
Recorded March 4, 1957, in Orchestra Hall by RCA
SCHUMANN Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54
Fritz Reiner, conductor
Recorded February 21, 1959, in Orchestra Hall by RCA
LISZT Totentanz for Piano and Orchestra
Fritz Reiner, conductor
Recorded February 23, 1959, in Orchestra Hall by RCA
PROKOFIEV Piano Concerto No. 1 in D-flat Major, Op. 10
Irwin Hoffman, conductor
Recorded by WFMT on April 20 and 21, 1967, in Orchestra Hall
Released in 1995 on From the Archives, vol. 10: Great Soloists
Happy, happy birthday!