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Although the USSR's system of identifying and training musically talented youngsters produced amazingly precocious pianists on a regular basis, Evgeny Kissin stood out from them as a talent far surpassing that of the usual Wunderkind. He has moved seemingly without difficulty to become one of the finest adult pianists on the world's concert stages. He began playing and improvising at the piano at the age of two. At the astonishing age of six he was admitted to the Gnessin School of Music for Gifted Children. His teacher there was Anna Pavlovna Kantor, who remained his only teacher. He debuted playing Mozart's K 466 Piano Concerto with the Orchestra of Ulyanovsky. His first solo recital was in Moscow at age eleven. In March, 1984, when he was twelve, he played both Chopin Concertos in the Moscow Conservatory Great Hall with Dmitri Kitaenko conducting the Moscow State Philharmonic. At this age he began making his first recordings, which remain in the catalogue. His debut in the West...