The “Rach 3″ (Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto) is one of the 20th-century masterpieces. Sergei Rachmaninoff composed it on his family’s country estate, Ivanovka. In the photo, he is looking over the final proofs of the concerto at Ivanovka.

The estate had been in the family for generations, but within a decade after these photos were supposedly taken, as was common after the Revolution with aristocratic families in Russia, the Bolsheviks confiscated the estate. After that, Rachmaninoff was never able to go home again, and that is the main reason he ended up in New York.

In New York, Rachmaninoff made do with decorating the place to look like Ivanovka.

He composed the third concerto for a premiere in the U.S. on his first trip here, and as a matter of fact, too rushed for time; he did not have a chance to rehearse it at all before leaving and had to practice it on a silent keyboard while on the ship.