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    Unavailable
    Moscow Nights: The Van Cliburn Story-How One Man and His Piano Transformed the Cold War
    Unavailable
    Moscow Nights: The Van Cliburn Story-How One Man and His Piano Transformed the Cold War
    Unavailable
    Moscow Nights: The Van Cliburn Story-How One Man and His Piano Transformed the Cold War
    Ebook679 pages11 hours

    Moscow Nights: The Van Cliburn Story-How One Man and His Piano Transformed the Cold War

    By Nigel Cliff

    4/5

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    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    Gripping narrative nonfiction that tells the dramatic story of a remarkable young Texan pianist, Van Cliburn, who played his way through the wall of fear built by the Cold War, won the hearts of the American and Russian people, and eased tensions between two superpowers on the brink of nuclear war.

    In 1958, an unheralded twenty-three-year-old piano prodigy from Texas named Van Cliburn traveled to Moscow to compete in the First International Tchaikovsky Competition. The Soviets had no intention of bestowing their coveted prize on an unknown American; a Russian pianist had already been chosen to win. Yet when the gangly Texan with the shy grin began to play, he instantly captivated an entire nation.

    The Soviet people were charmed by Van Cliburn’s extraordinary talent and fresh-faced innocence, but it was his palpable love for the music that earned their devotion; for many, he played more like a Russian than their own musicians. As enraptured crowds mobbed Cliburn’s performances, pressure mounted to award him the competition prize. "Is he the best?" Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev demanded of the judges. "In that case . . . give him the prize!"

    Adored by millions in the USSR, Cliburn returned to a thunderous hero’s welcome in the USA and became, for a time, an ambassador of hope for two dangerously hostile superpowers. In this thrilling, impeccably researched account, Nigel Cliff recreates the drama and tension of the Cold War era, and brings into focus the gifted musician and deeply compelling figure whose music would temporarily bridge the divide between two dangerously hostile powers.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateSep 20, 2016
    ISBN9780062333186
    Unavailable
    Moscow Nights: The Van Cliburn Story-How One Man and His Piano Transformed the Cold War
    Author

    Nigel Cliff

    Nigel Cliff is a historian, biographer, and translator. His first book, The Shakespeare Riots, was a finalist for the National Award for Arts Writing and was chosen as one of the Washington Post’s best books of the year. His second book, The Last Crusade: The Epic Voyages of Vasco da Gama, was a New York Times Notable Book. His most recent book is a translation and edition of The Travels by Marco Polo. A former film and theater critic for the London Times and contributor to The Economist, he writes for a range of publications, including the New York Times Book Review. A Fellow of Harris Manchester College, Oxford, he lives in London.

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    • 3/5
      This is a biography of Van Cliburn, a classical pianist from Texas who became world famous when he won the first International Tchaikovsky Competition which took place in Moscow in 1958. He was beloved in Russia, all the way from Kruschchev down to young, female, screaming fans to the extent that it almost seemed like pre-Beatlemania craziness. All of this took place in the middle of the Cold War between Russia and the United States, and Cliburn was apolitical but seemed particularly naive to how he was being manipulated by both sides. It is certainly an interesting glimpse of the time period, and the author gives us a fair amount of background information on the machinations which took place between the governments and military. Cliburn himself was totally immersed in his music, even forgetting to eat at times, and appeared to be an emotionally stunted man-child who had an extraordinarily close relationship with his mother. It was an interesting read.