The Talent That Was Liberace

By far the most famous, and infamous, piano player that ever lived was the flamboyant Liberace. This King of Pianos came from a humble background to be behind a tremendous wealth and fortune. From this youth to his old age, Liberace kept an air of grace, exuberance, and sophistication about him wherever he went.

Long before he ever played any of his famous mirrored or jewel encrusted pianos, Liberace was born to an Italian father and a Polish mother in West Allis, Wisconsin. The family was quite musically talented, with his father, Salvatore Liberace playing the French horn in the Milwaukee Philharmonic, his mother, Frances Liberace playing the piano, and two of three siblings also showing musical prowess. As a child, Walter Valentino Liberace, would often watch and listen to his parents playing their instruments of choice, but falling in love with pianos.

A family friend visited the Liberace home and offered young Walter a scholarship to the College of Music in Wisconsin. Liberace happily accepted the scholarship and went on to study at the collage as well as privately with Florence Bettray Kelly, once considered a protégé of the legendary Moritz Rosenthal. At the tender age of 14, Liberace completed his classical training and made his solo debut at the Chicago Symphony.

Making the night club routes, Liberace began playing pianos at some of the famous clubs in the country, including the Persian Room at the prestigious Plaza Hotel in New York City. At this point, he began using his last name only and appeared with the gold candelabra that would later become his trademark. A mere seven years after he played in the Persian Room, Liberace returned a star and brought along one of his infamous pianos with him.

Liberace became a part of Hollywood in the 1950s and started being a part of movie production. He was later offered a part in a television series and won two Emmy awards for his efforts. It proved to be a big hit all over the world both on television and radio. His television engagements however did not prevent him from performing and he gave house full performances in Carnegie Hall and Madison Square Garden.

The 1960s and 1970s saw Liberace dragging pianos all over the world, as he played capacity crowds in Europe and Australia. Also during this time, he began penning his autobiography and his famous cookbook, “Liberace Cooks.” Always philanthropic, Liberace created the Liberace Foundation that supports the Performing and Creative Arts through scholarship programs. The ever-busy piano player took home three consecutive Contemporary Keyboard Magazine “Pop Keyboard Artist of the Year” awards in addition to starting his own Las Vegas museum.

He continued his musical voyage in 1980s and played all the nominated songs perfectly at the 1982 Academy Awards. He worked tirelessly and kept drawing fans to different venues including Radio City Music Hall.

He left this world on his heavenly abode just before his 68th birthday. No one has since played his rhinestone encrusted pianos. The world awaits some one as talented as liberace, doubting whether there would be any one at all.

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Emanuel Daffy is the owner and operator of F pianos, the #1 source on the internet for information about pianos, For questions or comments about this article visit: www.azpianos.com/articles
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