Brendel was born in Wiesenberg, Czechoslovakia (now Loučná nad Desnou, Czech Republic). They moved to Zagreb, Yugoslavia (now Croatia), when Brendel was six where he began piano lessons with Sofija Deželić. He later to moved to Graz, Austria, and studied piano with Ludovica von Kaan at the Graz Conservatory and composition with Artur Michel. Towards the end of World War II, the 14-year-old Brendel was sent back to Yugoslavia to dig trenches.

After the war, Brendel composed music, as well as continuing to play the piano, to write and to paint. However, he never had more formal piano lessons, he was largely self-taught after the age of sixteen.

Brendel gave his first public recital in Graz at the age of 17. At the age of 21, he made his solo first recording, Franz Liszt's Weihnachtsbaum, the work's world premiere recording. He went on to make a string of other records, including three complete sets of the Ludwig van Beethoven piano sonatas. He was the first performer to record the complete solo piano works of Beethoven.

His breakthrough came after a recital of Beethoven at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, the day after which three major record labels called his agent. Around this time he moved to Hampstead, London, where he still resides. He is only the third pianist to have been awarded honorary membership of the Vienna Philharmonic.

Brendel is regarded as one of the major interpreters of Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert and Mozart. Toward the end of his concert career he stopped playing some of the most physically demanding pieces in the repertoire owing to problems with arthritis.

In November 2007 Brendel announced that he would retire from the concert platform after his concert of 18 December 2008 in Vienna. His final concert in New York was at Carnegie Hall on 20 February 2008. Since his debut at Carnegie Hall on 21 January 1973 he had appeared there 81 times, and in 1983 he became only the second pianist to perform the complete cycle of Beethoven's piano sonatas at the Hall, a feat he repeated in 1993.

Brendel has been married twice. His first marriage, from 1960 to 1972, was to Iris Heymann-Gonzala, and they had a daughter, Doris. In 1975, Brendel married Irene Semler, and the couple have three children; a son, Adrian, who is a cellist, and two daughters, Katharina and Sophie.
Source: Wikipedia

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