Nikolai Karlovich Medtner, born in January 1880 into a wealthy Moscow family, was a Russian composer and pianist with a distinctive musical voice. The youngest of five siblings, he received his first piano lessons from his mother, who herself had trained as a pianist and singer. From 1892, he studied at the Moscow Conservatory, where he was primarily trained as a pianist. His musical education was under the tutelage of renowned teachers such as Paul Pabst, Vasily Sapelnikov, and Vasily Safonov.
In 1900, Medtner graduated from the Conservatory with the Small Gold Medal for Piano. Shortly thereafter, he surprised his family and teachers with his decision to dedicate himself to composition rather than a career as a concert pianist. His first works were published starting in 1903. His close friend Sergei Rachmaninoff called him "the greatest living composer of his time"—a well-deserved accolade.
Medtner received a professorship at the Moscow Conservatory in 1909, but resigned after only a year. In 1915, he accepted another appointment and remained until 1921. After the October Revolution of 1917, he left Russia and emigrated to Germany in 1921, where he lived in Berlin until 1924. He later moved to London, where he died in 1951.
As a musician, Medtner was an exceptional thinker whose personality seemed detached from everyday life. The depth and power of his intellect, which was completely immersed in music, philosophy, and cultural history, was deeply respected by his contemporaries. His compositions are technically demanding yet highly accessible to listeners. He created entirely new and unusual soundscapes and was later recognized in Russia as an extremely influential figure for an entire generation of the Russian intellectual elite.