Sergei Rachmaninov was the fourth of six children born to a noble family, and lived in a family estate near Novgorod, where he enjoyed a happy childhood. He studied music with his mother from age 4; continued at the St. Petersburg Conservatory, and then graduated from the Moscow Conservatory in 1892, winning the Great Gold Medal for his new opera "Aleko". He was highly praised by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky , who promoted Rachmaninov's opera to the Bolshoi Theater in 1893. But the disastrous premiere of his 1st Symphony, (poorly conducted by Glazunov), coupled with his distress over the Russian Orthodox Church's pressure against his marriage, caused him to suffer from depression, which interrupted his career for three years until he sought medical help in 1900. He had a three-month treatment by a hypnotherapist, aimed at overcoming his writer's block. Upon his recovery, Rachmaninov composed his brilliant 2nd Piano Concerto, and made concert performances in Moscow. From 1904-1906 he was a conductor at the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow.
In 1909 he made his first tour of the United States having composed the 3rd Piano Concerto as a calling card. He appeared as a soloist with Gustav Mahler conducting the New York Philharmonic. In 1915 he wrote the choral masterpiece: "All-Night-Vigil", fifteen anthems expressing a plea for peace at a time of war. The Russian Revolution of 1917 and the destruction of his estate forced him to emigrate. On December 23, 1917, Rachmaninov left Russia on an open sledge carrying only a few books of sheet music. He made over a hundred recordings and gave over one thousand concerts in America alone between 1918 and 1943. His concert performances were legendary, and he was highly regarded as a virtuoso-pianist with unmatched power and expressiveness. Unusually wide chords and deeply romantic melody lines were characteristic of his compositions. Besides his own music, he often performed pieces by Ludwig van Beethoven, Frédéric Chopin , Franz Liszt and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky .
His home on Elm Drive in Beverly Hills had two Steinway pianos on which Rachmaninov played together with Vladimir Horowitz and other entertainers. His love of fast cars was second to music, and led him to occasional fines for exceeding the speed limit. His generosity was legendary. He gave away 5000 dollars to Igor Sikorsky to start an American helicopter industry. He paid for Vladimir Nabokov and his family relocation from Paris to New York. He sponsored Michael Chekhov and introduced him to Hollywood. He also gave numerous charitable performances, and donated money to the Allies fighting the Nazis during WWII. Rachmaninov became a US citizen just a few days before his death in Beverly Hills in 1943. In his last recital, in February, 1943, Rachmaninov played Chopin's Piano Sonata No. 2, featuring the famous "funeral march".
