Anatoly And Valentina

Linda S
Athens , GA

Both of my boys, aged 9 to 12, study with Anatoly. He is a wonderful pianist and a great teacher whose passion for music is only matched by his passion for teaching. My children have improved tremendously under his tutorage. He's dedicated to making your child a better musician. He chooses pieces to fit specific needs of your child.

Tomislav Z
Athens, GA

I am a senior at Clarke Central High school. Anatoly is the best piano teacher you can wish for. Under his guidance I have won many awards, but most importantly, I have learned how to love and play music. I am attaching the essay I wrote for my application for college (Harvard). I remember a four-year-old me standing mesmerized, listening to a stranger playing Chopin’s Waltz at a party. Ever since I have been enthralled with the beauty of classical music. I began taking piano lessons at age five and quickly gained some technical facility. I was happy when Anatoly Sheludyakov, a world class Russian pianist, agreed to be my teacher. He did not have any young students, and I was only in third grade. My immaturity, however, almost ended my musical journey. Used to everyone listening with admiration to me, the little boy playing difficult pieces, I felt hurt upon hearing Anatoly’s critiques. Spoiled with praise, I perceived them as an attempt to put down my playing and hard work. “Why did he not like me?” I wondered, and pouted. At the end of the year Anatoly suggested I find another teacher. We did not “click”, he said. But my stubbornness saved me. I refused to stop taking lessons from him, and improved my behavior. Though I struggled for some time with my dislike for critique, I took my teacher’s lessons to heart and began to develop a musical mind. Anatoly built my ability to play music, not just the notes on the page, from the ground up. Over the years, he showed me how to truly love music – how to let it into my soul, and how to pour my soul into it. He taught me about music history and style. At first I often transferred stylistic elements between pieces, which would make one of them sound completely out of character. Once, Anatoly told me not to play Bach in the style of Mendelssohn. Eventually, however, I was able to pick up on qualities in the styles of various composers, and to understand and interpret the emotional content of Beethoven, Chopin, and Haydn, among others. I knew Anatoly liked my playing when after a lesson he said “You understand Beethoven, you played this piece as if you are forty.” Performing a musical piece consists of more than playing in a certain style. Anatoly showed me the necessity of emotion in a performance; he taught me how to present each piece not as a series of passages, but as a story that can only be told properly by someone who can feel it in their mind and heart. “Music is the art of time,” he said, and I have seen this to be true when I play. The story one wants to tell cannot take shape if the timing is off – and by timing I do not mean the tempo, but the intricate pauses and elongations or shortenings of notes by fractions of seconds, which give music its shape, which transform a flat landscape of tones into a work of art. Although my teacher’s role has primarily focused on showing me how to be a true artist and how to interpret music emotionally, he has also imparted some very important life values. He showed me the power of critique, and taught me patience – patience in practicing and polishing a piece to as close to perfection as one can, and in general, patience in dealing with the world around me. Though I cannot say that I always took his advice (he told me I need to concentrate on doing one thing really well, but I still play cello and run), my piano teacher has helped me grow more than anyone – not just as a musician, but as a person. I have gone a long way with Anatoly, and I know I can go even further, even though we have little time left before I go to college. There seems to be no limit to what he can teach me, and I will always carry the intense love for music that he nurtured in me.