William Kapell

William Kapell stood among the most gifted American pianists to emerge in the generation after World War II, leaving a handful of recordings that later acquired legendary stature following his early death. His training started in New York with Dorothea Anderson la Follett and continued at the Philadelphia Conservatory under Olga Samaroff, whom he accompanied to the Juilliard School after her transfer there. In 1941 he captured both the Philadelphia Orchestra’s youth competition and the Naumberg Award; the latter prize brought his New York debut recital, which in turn received the Town Hall Award for the year’s most distinguished concert by an artist under thirty. A nationwide recital schedule soon followed, securing him a contract with RCA Victor Red Seal records. One of his strongest interests lay in the recently-composed Piano Concerto in D-Flat Major by Soviet composer Aram Khachaturian, a work he performed repeatedly; its extroverted and flashy character earned him a reputation as a specialist in such repertoire, yet his recorded legacy demonstrates equal command of appropriate style across graceful renditions of Mozart and powerful Prokofiev. After World War II he extended his touring to encompass the entire world, only to perish when his plane, returning from an Australian tour, struck King’s Mountain near San Francisco.