Josef Raieff, my teacher at Juilliard from 1962 to 1969 and my friend until the day of his death, would probably not have objected to the pun—since, along with music, he loved words and used them with virtuosity.

I had called him this past Thanksgiving Day; he sounded frail, but was mentally as sharp as ever. I assured him I would visit on my trip to New York in January—but fate had something else in store. Perhaps these reflections on a friendship of 42 years will serve as my substitute for a visit.

Before I began my work with Josef Raieff, I knew some of his students, and they were all very enthusiastic about him. (One in particular was a lovely girl from Virginia, a soft-spoken, indefatigable worker and a fine pianist.) Thus it was that, one morning in September 1962, I knocked not at all bravely on the door of Room 505. A surprisingly short, very well-dressed gentleman opened the door and invited me in. We chatted for a while, then he asked me to play—after which I glumly waited for the tepid comments I anticipated. Instead, Mr. Raieff looked at me very seriously and said, "Louie, you are talented and musical. You need to gain confidence, develop a repertoire, and play as often as possible. I want to help you. Let's go to work." I vividly remember thinking, "The sun has come out!" (I also remember leaving his studio and running into that lovely, soft-spoken girl, whose name was Julie, in the cafeteria.)

"He was my 'tonic' amid the modulations of my career. With his passing, I feel a personal sense of atonality."

Mr. Raieff wisely began by assigning me some very standard repertoire, such as the Beethoven Sonata in E-flat, Op. 31, No. 3, a difficult piece. (It was, I later learned, a sonata he played often on his concerts.) To my credit, I got a large percentage of the right notes. He worked me intensely on the Chopin E-Major Nocturne, trying to teach me about phrasing, legato, and, above all, beautiful tone. (His was a truly exquisite tone but at that time, I was unable fully to appreciate what beautiful tone was, and our work was only partly successful.)

In my second term, I discovered the Tchaikovsky G-Major Sonata and learned all of it quickly. I can only imagine how Mr. Raieff felt upon my presenting him with a half-hour of brilliant but often vapid music. Undaunted, he began to work with me, and this time what he offered began to sink in. We worked on producing the big orchestral sound the opening demands. We worked on finding the phrasing that could help the unpianistic and somewhat discursive second movement sound sensible. And he showed me some facilitations to ease the knotty technical problems of the finale. He taught me about tone production, about pedaling. And it was not too long before I was championing this clumsy work in recitals at Juilliard. To my surprise, I was receiving compliments for my performance, even as I was being questioned for my choice of repertoire!

Having regained a measure of confidence, I took on more ambitious repertoire—including Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. We plunged headlong into it; his ability to convey in words how he wanted me to think about a passage was remarkable. Over a period of several weeks, the music was shaped from a series of individual vignettes into a cohesive whole. He showed me radiant coloristic effects, and again, some ways around the not-so-comfortable piano writing. In this area, he was a genius! Finally, there came a lesson at which I was to play the entire piece, uninterrupted. He sat quietly through the music—until I got to the climax of "The Great Gate." To my utter astonishment, I saw Mr. Raieff literally running around the room, waving a handkerchief, yelling, "Flags waving, Louie; trumpets blaring—louder—aster—festive!" I have played Pictures many times, and never fail to reimagine that moment as I get to the climax of the last piece.

Three years ago, I came to New York and was to present an all-Schumann evening at Steinway Hall. Mr. Raieff was no longer able to attend concerts, so I visited him the next day, after the performance. "Play some of it for me," he demanded. After about six of the Papillons, he stopped me. "Very good, Louie. Now go over to my drawer there and bring me my score." I did. It was falling apart; there was a 1934 date on it. "Louie, why are you phrasing number five that way?" he asked, and began to gesture and conduct—singing with all the vigor of the 50-year-old whom I had met in 1962. He made me play it a third and even a fourth time before he cantankerously admitted it was improved. Then, uncharacteristically, he said: "I hope you don't mind my doing that!" I told him, "I cherish your doing that."

A year ago, Julie and I visited him. By now he was very frail, unable even to come to the door to greet me. But again, he wanted to hear me play. After the Haydn F-Minor Variations—one of his signature pieces during his career—he told me: "Louie, you are making a lovely rubato in the fourth or fifth bar, but it sounds artificial to me. The music has barely begun and you are doing something to it. It does not flow, and it seems to be manufactured. You are not being true to the music, nor to yourself as an artist when you graft artificiality onto the music." I thought about that a long time—and still do. It was the last teaching he did for me, and I cannot think of a more profound thought by which I can remember him. It changed my thinking about the opening of the Haydn, and it forced me to listen more deeply to my own playing of everything.

I could share other memories—like turning pages as he accompanied Julie in the Franck Symphonic Variations in one of his studio recitals. Or walking blocks and blocks, up and down Broadway, on a quest for the cigars he wanted. Or the time one of his students played cocktail music at a party in his apartment for more than three hours, Mr. Raieff complaining all the while that the piano sounded curiously muffled. When he finally lifted the lid to investigate, his Persian cat Tosca hopped out. But I think this is a good place to end. Josef Raieff remained for me the "tonic" amid all the modulations of my 40-plus-year career of performing and teaching. And with his passing, I feel a personal sense of atonality.

Oh, yes—one final observation. The lovely, soft-spoken girl I mentioned? Julie Jaffee and I were married in 1966, the year we both received our master's degrees from Juilliard. Although she was a fine pianist, she modulated to the field of psychology and is a recognized authority on the subject of stage-fright. She shares my feelings in these "Raiefflections." We both will miss Josef Raieff very much.

Louis Nagel (D.M.A. '73) is professor of piano at the University of Michigan School of Music.