Sophie Menter she became professor of piano at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory but left in 1886 to continue concertizing. Because of her popularity, Menter succeeded with music that no other pianist would touch. This included Liszt's First Piano Concerto, which she played in Vienna in 1869, 12 years after its disastrous premiere there. One of her recital specialties was a piece entitled "Rhapsodies". This was a composite of three of Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsodies—Nos. 2, 6 and 12—along with fragments from several others. She also composed various pieces for piano, mainly in a brilliant style, yet referred to her own compositional talent as
Don Gillis (composer) tone poems like "Portrait of a Frontier Town", piano concertos, rhapsodies for harp and orchestra, and six string quartets. He also composed a wide variety of band music. Gillis is best remembered as the composer of his "Symphony No. 5½, A Symphony for Fun", originally performed by Arturo Toscanini and the NBC Symphony Orchestra during a September 21, 1947, broadcast concert that Gillis also produced; it was preserved on transcription discs but not commercially issued. Since 2005, his symphonies have been recorded on the Albany Records label. Gillis sought to interpret contemporary American culture musically. His music drew upon popular