Alexander Kelly (pianist)

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Alexander Kelly (born June 30, 1929 in Edinburgh , † October 23, 1996 in London ) was a Scottish pianist and music teacher.

Kelly studied from 1946 at the Royal Academy of Music piano with Harold Craxton and composition with Lennox Berkeley . He made his debut as a pianist at the Royal Festival Hall with a piano concerto by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach under the direction of Thomas Beecham , played Beethoven's Diabelli Variations at Wigmore Hall and at the Edinburgh Festival and toured Eastern Europe, Asia and New Zealand. He was particularly interested in the piano works of Scottish composers such as Thomas Wilson , Robert Crawford , Martin Dalby , David Dorward , Thea Musgrave and John Purser . For his wedding to the cellist Margaret Moncrieff (1957), Peter Wishart composed a piano concerto for him. In addition to his wife, his chamber music partners included the violinist Jean Harvey , the flautist William Bennett , the singer Duncan Robertson and later his daughter, the cellist Alison Moncrieff-Kelly .

From 1960 to 1994 Kelly was a professor at the Royal Academy of Music. From 1984 to 1992 he headed the Department for Keyboard Instruments. His numerous students included Michael Dussek , Vanessa Latarche , David Owen Norris , Jonathan Plowright , Jeremy Carter , Alan Gravill , Simon Murray , Graham Caskie , Tim Byram-Wigfield , Helen Burford , Simon Mulligan , Heather Chamberlain , Lincoln Noel , Stuart Hutchinson , Juliet Edwards , Danny Driver and Christian Roos.

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