A student of Josef Hoffman at the Curtis Institue of Muaic in Philadelphia, Cherkassky followed his teacher's request that he practise four hours day to the end of his llong career as a concert pianist. It was after his Wigmore Hall recital of 27 March 1957 that Cherkassky's career accelerated in the United Kingdom, and, following the death of his mother in Nice in 1961, he settled in London where he lived at The White House Hotel until his death in 1995. It was only in the last few decades of his life that he was recognized as one of the greatest pianists - a re-creative genius who relished spontaneity, beauty of sound and the kaleidoscopic possibilities of the piano. A short man Cherkassky always had his piano stoool set low to be close to the keyboard.

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