Géza Anda

Géza Anda (19 November 1921 – 14 June 1976) was a Hungarian pianist.

Quotes about Anda

 * I think Michelangeli in some repertory is absolutely incredible, especially Debussy. One special favorite of mine is Géza Anda who I think is such an underrated pianist and a great musician. A lot of young people don’t know him. There was such a natural way of making music in what he does. He was spontaneous, so alive, totally without makeup, and so honest. Without being shy, he takes risks. His playing is a wonderful combination of intellect and intuition. And, of course, I adore Lipatti, the best of Schnabel, and Horowitz at his best. He orchestrated at the piano.
 * Leif Ove Andsnes, in At the piano : interviews with 21st-century pianists (2012) by Caroline Benser


 * The magic of Anda's piano playing lies primarily in his extraordinary culture of touch. There are just a very few piano sounds in the world just as beautiful. [...] When he plays passages, and even longer, tied scale-like melodies across the whole keyboard, the tone color changes like alternating human voices: the alto becomes tenor, the tenor darkens to bass. And then there are those special, hardly pressed, almost just palpated middle voices running and gliding through in the Schumann work, that conjures almost a hoffmannian atmosphere around Anda's performance. Is it still the technique, a question of touch only? By no means. We have been talking about the music for a long time […]
 * György Kroó, following a recital in Budapest, 1973 (Liszt Academy Alumni)