Géza Anda was born in Budapest on November 19, 1921.

He studied with Ernst von Dohnányi and Zoltan Kodály at the Budapest Academy of Music, and won the Liszt Prize in 1940.

A year later, shortly after playing Brahms under Mengelberg, he made his debut in the Berlin Philharmonie, where Furtwängler dubbed him “the troubador of the piano”.

He was only 20 – and had already begun to teach piano.

In 1943 he settled in Switzerland.

From 1953 to 1955 he gave a masterclass at the International Summer Academy of the Mozarteum in Salzburg, and in 1960 he succeeded Edwin Fischer as director of the Lucerne masterclasses.

From 1969 he taught in Zürich.