Ossip Gabrilowitsch
Ossip Gabrilowitsch was an American pianist and conductor. He was born in St. Petersburg on January 26 (February 7), 1878, and died in Detroit on September 14, 1936.
From 1888 to 1894, he studied piano and composition at the St. Petersburg Conservatory with Anton Rubinstein, Anatoly Lyadov, and Alexander Glazunov. After graduating, he spent two years in Vienna studying piano with Theodor Leschetizky.
From 1910 to 1914, Gabrilowitsch conducted the Munich Musical Society Orchestra. After moving to the United States, he became music director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in 1918 while continuing his career as a concert pianist. He made the opening of a new concert hall for the orchestra a condition of taking the post, helping bring about the creation of Orchestra Hall.
Gabrilowitsch married singer Clara Clemens, daughter of Mark Twain, in 1909. He wrote a modest number of works, mostly short pieces for piano, including Five Piano Pieces, Op. 1; Gavotte in D minor, Op. 2; Burlesque Caprice and Melancholy Mazurka from Compositions for the Piano, Op. 3; and The Tsarina, a Russian Mazurka. His other works include Three Songs, Op. 11, and two piano pieces, Op. 12: Elegy and Étude for the Left Hand. He was buried with Clara Clemens and her father in the family plot at Woodlawn Cemetery in Elmira, New York.