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Camille Saint-Saëns composed his Cello Concerto No. 1 in A minor, Op. 33 in 1872, when the composer was 37 years old. He wrote this work for the Belgian cellist, viola de gamba player and instrument maker Auguste Tolbecque. Tolbecque was part of a distinguished family of musicians closely associated with the Société des Concerts du Conservatoire, France’s leading concert society. Nikolai Myaskovsky composed his Cello Concerto in C minor, Op. 66, during the years 1944–45. It ranks among the few works of the composer that is to be found most frequently in concert or on recordings. The concerto was written for Sviatoslav Knushevitsky, one of Myaskovsky's great champions, who premiered it in Moscow on 17 March 1945. The first recording, however, was made by Mstislav Rostropovich in 1956. That the cello's repertoire has been so wonderfully enriched during the 20th century is due largely to Mstislav Rostropovich, the most influential cellist of his time, a champion of liberty, and also a noted conductor and pianist. Born In Baku on 27 March 1927 to a pianist mother and a cello-playing father who had studied with Pablo Casals, 'Slava' received early paternal grounding in his chosen instrument. Rostropovich was closely associated with EMI Classics (now Warner Classics) for more than 50 years, having made 100 recordings with the company between 1954 and his death in 2007, just a month after celebrations for his 80th birthday at the Kremlin.