This photograph was taken in 1954 during an audition for the film 'Barbu Lautarul' ['Barbu the Fiddler'], which was going to be produced at the Buftea studios. The film wasn't produced in the end. I, Dan Mizrahy, was going to play the part of Liszt, as one can see in the picture.
I'm a pianist, a teacher, a composer, a member of the Union of the Romanian Composers and Musicologists. I loved to play and I have always found pleasure in playing. I loved the stage and respected it. From 1946, I gave numerous recitals and concerts as a soloist of the local philharmonics, playing Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, and Gershwin. I went on tours to Italy, the US, and Israel. A promoter of Gershwin, I was the first to introduce the entire work of the American composer to the Romanian public; in 2002, the 'Electrecord' Recording Company launched a double CD featuring my performance of Gershwin.
As a teacher, I was a founding member of the first secondary music school in the country, today’s 'Dinu Lipatti' High School in Bucharest. I taught at the People's School of Performing Arts from 1960-1999, and I was an associated professor at the National Music University in Bucharest in 2000. I mainly composed vocal music: lieder, romances, light music, choruses; most of my works were recorded by the National Radio Broadcasting Company. I wrote an autobiographical book entitled 'That’s How It Was', which is due to be published by the Hasefer Publishing Company in the fall of 2005.
