Rachmaninoff's Song without Words: Lento in D Minor

In 1886, the thirteen-year-old Sergei Rachmaninoff was taken by his teacher Nikolai Zverev to Crimea, where Rachmaninoff continued his studies, hoping to gain entrance into Anton Arensky's harmony class at the Moscow Conservatory. It was during this time that Rachmaninoff created his first composition, a two-page Étude in F-sharp Major (the manuscript of which is now lost). After admission to the class, he produced ten exercises, the earliest of which is Song without Words: Lento in D Minor (1887?), the only surviving piece of the ten.

A Russian piano virtuoso, Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873 - 1943) was one of the last great composers of the Romantic era of music. His compositions are renowned for their lyricism, expressive breadth, structural ingenuity, and a tonal palette of rich distinctive colors.

Tutorial

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Sheetmusic at imslp.org