Rudolph Ganz (24 February 1877 – 2 August 1972) was a Swiss-born American pianist, conductor, composer, and music educator. Career Early career as a pianist and conductor Born in Zurich, Ganz studied cello with Friedrich Hegar and piano with Robert Freund at the Zürich Musikschule. He also took composition lessons with Charles Blanchet at the Lausanne Conservatory (de). From 1897 to 1898, Ganz studied piano with Fritz Blumer in Strasbourg, and from 1899 to 1900 with Ferruccio Busoni in Berlin and Weimar and composition with Heinrich Urban in Berlin. On 7 December 1899, he made his piano debut with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra; and on 14 April 1900, his conducting debut with this orchestra in the world premiere of his own Symphony No. 1 in E major. In May, Florenz Ziegfeld, Sr. visited Berlin and invited Ganz to join the piano department of the Chicago Musical College. In August 1900, Ganz moved to Chicago. Ganz joined the piano department and became a member of the board of directors of the Chicago Musical College from fall 1900 through spring 1905. On March 20, 1903, Ganz made his American orchestral debut as soloist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Theodore Thomas in the first Chicago performance of Vincent d'Indy's Symphony No. 1, at the Auditorium Theatre. On 5 March 1905, in a Chicago recital at the Music Hall, Fine Arts Building (Chicago), Ganz became the first pianist to perform Maurice Ravel's music (Jeux d'eau (Ravel)) in the United States (Harold Bauer played a first Boston performance of Jeux d'eau on 4 December 1905). From fall 1905 to spring 1908 Ganz lived in New York City and began concert tours throughout North America, Europe, and Cuba. On 8 November 1907, in New York's Mendelssohn Hall, Ganz played the American premiere of Ravel's Oiseaux tristes and Barque sur l'ocean (from Miroirs, 1905). In 1908 he moved to Berlin to teach and concertize. He played first Berlin performances of Vincent d'Indy and Béla Bartók and first London performances of Ravel and John Alden Carpenter. His Berlin pupils included Chicago pianist Edward Joseph Collins, St. Louis pianist Leo C. Miller, Kansas City pianist and later Ganz's assistant Mollie Margolies, Norwegian pianist Nils Larsen, and American composers Charles Haubiel and Edward Ballantine. In 1913 Ganz began recording piano rolls for Welte-Mignon and Duo-Art, and in 1916 for Pathé. At the outbreak of World War I in 1914,