MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Beethoven: Piano Concertos Nos. 2 & 5

Evgeny Kissin was born in Moscow in 1971 and began to play and improvise on the piano at the age of two. He entered the Moscow Gnessin School of Music for Gifted Children at the age of six, where he studied with Anna Pavlovna Kantor. At the age of ten he made his performing debut playing Mozart's Piano Concerto K. 466 with the Orchestra of Ulyanovska, and he gave his first solo recital in Moscow at age eleven. He first came to international attention in March 1984, when he performed the two Chopin concertos in the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory with the Moscow State Philharmonic under Dmitri Kitaenko.

Kissin made his West European debut in 1987 at the Berlin Festival, and in 1988 he toured Europe with the Moscow Virtuosi and Vladimir Spivakov. He made his BBC Promenade debut under David Atherton in 1988 and took part in the Berlin Philharmonic's New Year's Eve concert under the late Herbert von Karajan. In September 1990 he made an acclaimed North American debut playing both Chopin piano concertos with the New York Philharmonic and Zubin Mehta. The following week, the young pianist opened Carnegie Hall's centennial season with a spectacular debut recital. Next autumn he celebrates the tenth anniversary of this debut with a major recital tour of North America.

Since then, musical awards from around the world have been heaped upon Kissin. He was special guest at the 1992 Grammy Awards ceremony, and he became the youngest-ever Musical America Instrumentalist of the Year in 1995. In 1997 he received the prestigious Triumph Award for Outstanding Contribution to Russia's Culture - the youngest awardee ever.

In the summer of 1997 Kissin became the first pianist ever to give a recital in the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall. The concert was a sell-out and is considered by the BBC to have been one of the highlights of the Festival. He has given concerto performances every year since at the Proms.