Jorge Bolet

The legendary Cuban American pianist

I wanted to come face to face with a master:
I recognised him as such.
Hélène Grimaud, pianist

Sound on

This website is a shorter version of a much fuller one

Jorge Bolet was born in Havana, Cuba in 1914. Admitted to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia at the age of 12, he went on to have a career that was difficult and painstaking, despite his formidable gifts, and it was only in the 1970s that he achieved the sort of recognition he ought to have had all along: one of the great pianists.

He specialised in the Romantic composers, above all Franz Liszt, but also adored the rare and hidden gems of the repertoire - and the more outrageous the technical difficulties, so much the better.

Jorge Bolet used an English pronunciation of his name: George Bo-LETTE (with stress falling on the final syllable & with the T pronounced).