György Sándor

Born 21 September 1912, died 9 December 2005 György Sándor was a Hungarian pianist, friend of Béla Bartók and champion of his music. Sándor was born in Budapest. He studied at the Liszt Academy in Budapest under Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály, and debuted as a performer in 1930. He toured as a concert pianist through the 1930s, making his Carnegie Hall debut in 1939. He became an American citizen and served in the Army Signal Corps and the Intelligence and Special Services from 1942 to 1944. Sándor remained friends with Bartók throughout his life, and was one of only ten people who attended Bartók's funeral in 1945. Sándor played the world premiere of Bartók's Piano Concerto No. 3 on 8 February, 1946 with The Philadelphia Orchestra and Eugene Ormandy in Philadelphia, Pa. The performance was repeated later that year by the same ensemble in New York, and recorded for Columbia Masterworks. Following the war, he returned to the concert stage. His repertoire concentrated on Hungarian and Russian works. He recorded the complete piano works of Kodály, of Sergei Prokofiev, and of Bartók; for the latter he won the Grand Prix du Disque of the Charles Cros Academy in 1965.