Pianist Hailed

When Gina Bachauer made her U.S. piano debut in Manhattan's Town Hall last October, the hall was less than half full; few had ever heard of her. The New York Times gave the assignment to one of the low men on its critical totem pole. But Times Critic Harold Schonberg's glowing critique ("In the foremost ranks of pianists, male or female...transcendent technique...grand tradition of pianists") reported the first piano sensation of the season. Last week, when Gina Bachauer, 38, gave her second recital, the hall was packed.

Before an audience of the sternest judges--including the first-string critics this time--Bachauer got off to a fine start. Opening with a transcription of the Vivaldi Concerto in D Minor, she proved that she commands plenty of pianistic thunder & lightning. Then, in a Mozart sonata, she awed her audience with her grace of phrase, her delicacy of tone and touch. And so it went. There were points of phrasing, tempo and concept in her Beethoven and Chopin to cavil at; she is the kind of pianist who plays as she feels at the moment. But by recital's end, nobody in Town Hall doubted that Gina Bachauer is indeed a pianist to reckon with.

Born near Athens to a Viennese father and an Italian mother, Gina got most of her training at the Athens Conservatory. There she studied with a onetime Moscow classmate of the great Sergei Rachmaninoff; when he could teach her no more, he passed her on to Rachmaninoff him self, in London. Rachmaninoff, who had no time or taste for teaching, listened for half an hour, agreed to take her on. Later, she also worked with Alfred Cortot.

With her husband, who died last year, Gina spent the war in Egypt. She made herself a host of fans among hospitalized British soldiers & sailors, even learned to play boogie-woogie to please them. Now, although she makes her home in London most of the year, she travels to Athens every December to play for one special fan on his birthday: Greece's King Paul, who, says Bachauer, is pretty good at the keyboard himself.

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