Aloys and Alfons Kontarsky

Aloys (14 May 1931 – 22 August 2017)[1][2] and Alfons (9 October 1932 – 5 May 2010)[3][4] Kontarsky were German duo-pianist brothers who were associated with a number of important world premieres of contemporary works.

[5] In 1955 they formed their piano duo "Klavierduo Kontarsky" and performed regularly from 1959 until Aloys became paralyzed in 1983 as the result of two strokes.

[8][9] As a piano duo, the brothers gave first performances of works by Luciano Berio, Sylvano Bussotti, Mauricio Kagel, Karlheinz Stockhausen,[10] Henri Pousseur, Luis de Pablo,[5] and Bernd Alois Zimmermann.

[13] Their more traditional fare includes the complete Brahms Hungarian Dances and Schubert's Fantasia in F minor, D.940.

[15] It seems unlikely this was Aloys, who in 1983 suffered two debilitating strokes, which left him paralyzed on one side with visual and speech disorders.

[6] Their students included: York Höller, Steffen Schleiermacher, Christine Gerwig and Efraín González Ruano,[16] Anna Haas-Niewiedział and Piotr Niewiedział,[17] Douglas Nemish and Dominique Morel,[18] and many others.