MUSIC

Soviet pianist Vladimir Feltsman, whose promising career was halted eight years ago when he applied for an exit visa to Israel, has announced that his request to emigrate had been granted by the Soviet government. Feltsman, who appeared in a segment of CBS News’ recent “Seven Days in May” documentary about the Soviet Union, won the Marguerite Long piano competition in 1971 but had performed only in small provincial towns and army camps since he made clear his desire to leave the country in 1979. “I am very happy to receive this news,” Feltsman told the New York Times. “But I know it will also be painful to leave my country, which I love--though I do not love its political system.”