GUIDO AGOSTI (1901-1989)
Italian pianist

Guido Agosti was a student of Busoni and the teacher of many well known pianists, Maria Tipo the greatest of all.  Agosti was one of those performers whose stage fright never left him causing him to concentrate on teaching.  Among his students were Yonty Solomon, Peter Bithell, Leslie Howard, Barbara Lister-Sink, Martin Jones, Donna Amato, Vladimir Krpan, Hamish Milne, Dag Achatz, Sergio Calligaris, Raymond Lewenthal, Kun-Woo Paik, Jean-Pierre Ferey, Daniel Pollack, William Corbett Jones, Angela Brownridge, Ian Munro, Geneviève Calame, and Eric van Griensven, some of whose names you surely know.

I have only found a few recordings by this important pianist, but the Debussy preludes he recorded at the age of seventy are indeed wonderful, and somewhat reminiscent of Debussy's own playing.

Guido Agosti was also an exceptional chamber musician and accompanist.  Among those with whom he performed was the great Belgian soprano, Suzanne Danco.  Another was the Hungarian violinist Ferenc de Vecsey. Here are several of their collaborations.

Finally, I offer Guido Agosti's excellent transcription of the Firebird Suite which I consider to be one of the finest transcriptions of an orchestral work for solo piano that I know.  I do not know if Agosti ever recorded it himself, but we havea masterful performance by the young Swiss pianist, Francesco Piemontesi.

Debussy  from Préludes, Book I

recorded in 1971

II Voiles: Modéré