Sviatoslav Richter

Sviatoslav Teofilovich Richter, a Soviet and Russian classical pianist, lived from March 20, 1915, to August 1, 1997. He is often ranked among the finest pianists of the twentieth century, admired for his interpretive depth, technical brilliance, and enormous repertoire.

Richter was born in Zhitomir, in what was then the Russian Empire’s Volhynia Governorate (now part of Ukraine), where both his parents had roots. His father, Teofil Danilovich Richter, a pianist, organist, and composer of German descent, had studied at the Vienna Conservatory from 1893 to 1900. His mother, Anna Pavlovna Richter, came from a Russian noble landowning family and had once been a student of her future husband. During the Civil War in 1918, while his parents were in Odessa, Richter was separated from them and lived with his aunt Tamara until 1921. It was she who first sparked his interest in art, teaching him painting. When the family reunited, they moved to Odessa, where Teofil taught at the Odessa Conservatory and briefly served as an organist at a Lutheran church. Richter later said his father got the conservatory post shortly after his birth, though a recently found document suggests Witold Maliszewski may have offered the job as early as 1914.

In the early 1920s, Richter developed a passion for music, along with cinema, literature, and theatre, and began learning piano. Remarkably, he was mostly self-taught; his father gave him only basic instruction, as did one of his father’s pupils, a Czech harpist. Even as a child, Richter was an outstanding sight-reader and regularly accompanied local opera and ballet companies. This early exposure fostered a lifelong love for opera, vocal music, and chamber works, later expressed through the festivals he founded in La Grange de Meslay, France, and at Moscow’s Pushkin Museum. At fifteen, he started working at the Odessa Opera, accompanying rehearsals.

Richter’s first public recital took place on March 19, 1934, at the Engineers’ Club in Odessa, featuring an all-Chopin program that included the Ballade No. 4 and Etude No. 4. The concert went well—he later recalled that the Fourth Ballade was especially well received, despite his own harsh self-criticism. Although Odessa journalists were present, the event received no press coverage. Around this time, Richter’s father faced repeated humiliation and abuse at the Odessa Conservatory. Though a gifted pianist, composer, and Vienna Conservatory graduate, he was forbidden from teaching piano students. The identities of those responsible have never been made public.

Richter did not begin formal piano study until three years later, when he sought out Heinrich Neuhaus at the Moscow Conservatory. At his audition, he played Beethoven’s Sonata No. 28 and some of his own compositions. Neuhaus whispered to a fellow student, “I believe he is a musician of genius.” Although Neuhaus taught many notable pianists, including Emil Gilels and Radu Lupu, he reportedly considered Richter the genius pupil he had waited his whole life for, while admitting he taught Richter “almost nothing.” Richter also tried composing early on, even playing his own works at that audition, but gave it up soon after moving to Moscow. He later explained, “Perhaps the best way I can put it is that I see no point in adding to all the bad music in the world.”

By the start of World War II, Richter’s parents’ marriage had broken down, and his mother had fallen in love with another man. Because his father was German, authorities suspected him, and a plan was made to evacuate the family. But his mother, unwilling to leave due to her new relationship, stayed in Odessa. In August 1941, Teofil Richter was arrested, found guilty of espionage, and sentenced to death on October 6, 1941. Sviatoslav did not speak to his mother again until nearly twenty years later, just before her death, during his first US tour. He vowed never to perform in Odessa again—and kept that promise.

In 1943, Richter met Nina Dorliak, an operatic soprano, at a memorial service for Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko. He caught up with her on the street and offered to accompany her in recital. Though often reported as married around that time, they never officially registered their union. They lived together from about 1945 until Richter’s death, without children. According to Michel Krielaars, their relationship was purely platonic. Dorliak supported Richter through his complex private life and career, cared for him during his final illness, and died herself less than a year later, on May 17, 1998. After his death, it was suggested that Richter was homosexual and that his companion provided a social front, since homosexuality was widely taboo and could carry legal consequences. Krielaars quotes three people who knew Richter personally, saying that “of course” he was gay. Richter was intensely private, usually quiet and withdrawn, and refused interviews. He never discussed his personal life publicly until his last year.