Pianist Eugene Istomin dies at 78

10/10/2003

WASHINGTON -- Eugene Istomin, one of America's foremost classical pianists, died Friday at his home in Washington, where he had lived since 1980. He was 78 and suffered from liver cancer.

Born in New York City to parents from Russia, Istomin's talent was recognized when he was 12 and he entered the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. He studied there under Rudolf Serkin.

At 18 he made sensational debuts in the same week with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Eugene Ormandy and the New York Philharmonic under Artur Rodzinski, playing Johannes Brahms' Second Piano Concerto.

Istomin did his first concert with Washington's National Symphony orchestra in 1945 in a program of work by Frederic Chopin, especially appreciated because of a film on Chopin's life that was popular at the time.

At 25 he began a long association with cellist Pablo Casals and married his widow, Marta, now president of the Manhattan School of Music. They had no children.

In a career that carried him on repeated travels to many countries, he gave more than 4,000 concerts with leading conductors -- Bruno Walter, Fritz Reiner, George Szell, Leopold Stokowski and Leonard Bernstein.