An eccentric pianist

[clareybeary]

What pianist cut the skin between their forefinger and thumb in order to reach more keys?

[Buenchico]

Mozart certainly did, but there may have been others.

Chris

[clareybeary]

brilliant, thank-you. for some reason i always thought it was chopin...

[Abdulmajid]

Can't be more eccentric than the pianist in "Shine" the movie.

he was one weird cookie, but I have forgotten his name.

Great movie if you haven't seen it by the way.

[Buenchico]

Now you've got me worried.

I felt confident about my 'Mozart' answer and a bit of Googling seemed to confirm it. So I Googled the following line to see if anyone agreed with Chopin:
chopin "cut the skin"

There were no posts found that suggested that the answer should be Chopin. However, Google did find this forum, where it's stated that Liszt might be the answer to your question:
http://vnboards.ign.com/galahad/b20663/1081998 78/p3/

While Mozart played the piano, Liszt is probably thought of as more of a virtuoso performer (as well, of course, as a composer), so perhaps he fits the bill better than Mozart?

Chris

[whiffy]

Brahms and Rachmaninov had extraordinarily large hands, try playing their piano music. Not a helpful answer to your question I know, but give it a try.

[littleoldme]

For Abdulmajid - Shine was about the life of Australian pianist David Helfgott.

[clareybeary]

Thanks for all your help.
I've seen Shine, it's a brilliant film.