Moriz Rosenthal was an Austrian pianist of Galician-Jewish origin. He was born in Lviv to Leon Rosenthal, a teacher from Kamianets-Podilskyi, and Augusta Kanner, who came from Tysmenytsia.
Rosenthal began studying music with Wenzel Galat, a violist at the city theater. From 1872 he studied with Carl Mikuli, a former assistant to Frédéric Chopin, adopting Chopin’s characteristic graceful legato. In 1875 he continued his studies in Vienna with Rafael Joseffy, who arranged his first concert there and accompanied him on a second piano. The following year, Rosenthal made his first tour, performing in Romania and receiving an appointment as court pianist at the princess’s request. He studied with Franz Liszt in Weimar and Rome from 1876 to 1878, then paused his performing career to study at the University of Vienna.
Rosenthal returned to active concert work in 1886. His first United States tour followed in 1889, opening with a joint concert in New York with the 14-year-old Fritz Kreisler. In 1890 he published School of Advanced Piano Playing, a collection of exercises written with Ludwig Schitte. He continued touring internationally into the late 1930s. A 1937 review in Time praised his power and the increased subtlety of his phrasing.
Rosenthal remained in New York in his later years and suffered from Parkinson’s disease. In 1920 he married his student Hedwig Löwy, a piano teacher.