First prize winner of the Mendelssohn Competition in 1961, and the only student of the great Julius Katchen, Theodor Breu devoted his life to his passion: music.

He was born with a gift that immediately placed him above all others. One can only feel small before the overwhelming force of his music. The rare listeners who have had the privilege of hearing him have come away forever transformed. The purity and sincerity of his playing lead us straight to God.

Even today, I listen to him breathless, with shivers running through my whole body.

Since that first encounter and that musical lightning bolt, I have known where I must go. I measure the immense good fortune I had in crossing his path, and the great honour he grants me in transmitting his knowledge and his artistry.

Edson Elias, Brazilian pianist, professor at the Geneva Conservatory and at the École Nationale Supérieure de Musique de Paris, now deceased, radically changed the way I understood the piano.

Until I met him, I was following the lineage of Asian pianists, mastering what is commonly called piano technique. Hearing him play Mozart sonatas allowed me to glimpse the abyss that separated me from his world. Before him, I liked to compare the purity of his music to the softness of a baby’s skin. It was then that I decided to come to France to study with him, to forget everything I had been taught. This difficult experience, full of obstacles and dead ends, helped me profoundly to develop the sound I was seeking.

Edson Elias, endowed with remarkable intelligence and an exceptional gift for teaching, guided me in this search without ever seeking to impose on me a technique that was uniquely his own.