Brahms Piano Trio

• Piano Trio

Biography

Brahms Piano Trio:

Violinist Alla Aranovskaya started to play the piano at age two, but switched to the study of violin at age six when entering music school. She has studied at the Rimsky-Korsakov Music College and the St. Petersburg Conservatory. After graduation in 1987, she joined the faculty of the St. Petersburg Conservatory. Not long afterward, she and cellist Leonid Shukayev founded the St. Petersburg String Quartet. Since 1999, the St. Petersburg Quartet has been in residence at Oberlin College. Her husband, Misha, is a photographer and string instrument specialist. She has two sons, Misha and Dima. Cellist Leonid Shukayev was born in St. Petersburg and began his study of music at age six. He studied at the Rimsky-Korsakov Music College, and later at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. His studies were interrupted for a year and a half by service in the army, after which he returned to the Conservatory. He is a co-founder of the St. Petersburg Quartet.

The Quartet has been in residence at Oberlin College since 1999. His wife, Nadezhda Shabanina, is a singer, and they have two sons, Armand and Tioma. Pianist Maxim Mogilevsky made his debut at age 13 with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra. He continued his studies at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, earning his master's and postgraduate assistantship diplomas.

A Tchaikovsky Scholarship in 1990 enabled him to study at Julliard. In 1993, he relocated to Indiana University at South Bend, earning his master's degree. Mr. Mogilevsky won the International Music Competition of Japan in 1989 and the Unisa Piano Competition in South Africa in 1992. He was also the winner of the 1995 International Piano Competition of Opporto (Portugal), and an Angel Award winner at the 1997 Edinburgh Festival.

In 2001, as a member of the Mogilevsky/Smolina Duo (with his wife, pianist Svetlana Smolina), he won the Murray Dranoff Grand Prize, Audience Prize and Casadesus Award.