Peter Adolf Serkin (July 24, 1947 – February 1, 2020) was an American classical pianist. He won the Grammy Award for Most Promising New Classical Recording Artist in 1966, and he performed globally, known for not only "technically pristine" playing but also a "commitment to contemporary music". He taught at the Curtis Institute of Music, the Juilliard School, Yale University, and Bard College. Early life Serkin was born on July 24, 1947, in Manhattan. He was the son of Irene Busch Serkin and pianist Rudolf Serkin, grandson of the influential violinist Adolf Busch, and great-nephew of conductor Fritz Busch. Peter was given the middle name Adolf in honor of his grandfather. He spent much of his childhood on his parents' farm in Guilford, Vermont. In 1958, at age 11, Serkin began studying at the Curtis Institute of Music, where his teachers included the Polish pianist Mieczysław Horszowski, the American virtuoso Lee Luvisi, as well as his own father. He graduated in 1964 at age 16. He also studied with Ernst Oster, flutist Marcel Moyse, and Karl Ulrich Schnabel. Career Serkin's concert career began in 1958, when he first performed at the Marlboro Music Festival, a seminal agent and incubator of chamber music performance in the U.S., established in 1951 by his father Rudolf Serkin, Hermann and Adolf Busch, and Marcel, Blanche and Louis Moyse. Following that performance, Peter Serkin was invited to play with major orchestras such as the Cleveland Orchestra under George Szell and the Philadelphia Orchestra with Eugene Ormandy. In 1966, at age 19, Serkin was awarded the Grammy Award for Most Promising New Classical Recording Artist. Three of his recordings garnered Grammy nominations (one of them features six Mozart concertos; the two others feature the music of Olivier Messiaen) and his recordings won other awards. Serkin was the first pianist to receive the Premio Internazionale Musicale Chigiana award in 1983 and he received an honorary doctorate from the New England Conservatory of Music in 2001. In 1968, shortly after marrying and becoming a father, Serkin decided to stop playing music altogether. In the winter of 1971, he, his wife, and baby daughter Karina moved to a small rural town in Mexico. About eight months later, on a Sunday morning, Serkin heard the music of Johann Sebastian Bach being broadcast over the radio from a neighbor's house. As he listened, he said, "It became clear to me that