Background
Anatole Kitain was born in Saint St. Petersburg into a family of professional musicians.
Anatole Kitain was born in Saint St. Petersburg into a family of professional musicians.
He began his studies in the St. Petersburg Conservatoire, but the political instability of the time led his family to move to Kiev, where he studied in the conservatoire with Sergei Tarnowsky.
He showed early promise, performing his own nocturne for the astonished Glazunov at the age of six. (Other pianists studying at the Kiev Conservatory at that time included Vladimir Horowitz, Alexander Uninsky and Alexander Brailowsky). In time, Kitain became the private pupil of Felix Blumenfeld, whose few private pupils also included Simon Barere and Horowitz.
Kitain settled in France, but the outbreak of the second world war prompted him to move to the United States of America. However, success eluded him there.
In what seems to have been an attempt to make a fresh start, he changed his name in 1944 to Alexander Karinoff, but reverted to his own name two years later. Despite a certain amount of critical success, he remained overshadowed by the ubiquitous figure of his former classmate, Horowitz.