Concert Pianist and Psychiatrist
West Side Story: The Mind and Music of Leonard Bernstein
Richard Kogan has a distinguished career both as a concert pianist and as a psychiatrist. He is Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College and the Artistic Director of the Weill Cornell Music and Medicine Program. He has been praised for his “exquisite playing” by the New York Times, and The Boston Globe wrote that “Kogan has somehow managed to excel at the world’s two most demanding professions.”
Dr. Kogan has gained renown for his lecture-recitals that explore the role of music in healing, and the influence of psychological forces and psychiatric and medical illness on the creative output of composers such as Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Gershwin, Leonard Bernstein and Scott Joplin.
He has been the recipient of numerous awards, and he has recorded the DVD “Music and the Mind” for Yamaha. Yoyo Ma wrote of this DVD, “I came away from this extraordinary lecture and performance deeply moved by a fascinating presentation that only Richard Kagan psychiatrist and concert pianist can deliver”
Dr. Kogan has given these programs at medical conferences, music festivals, concert series, and other venues throughout the world. Dr. Kogan humanizes medicine as he shares an insight and journey into some of the most creative minds.