Nikolai Vladimirovich Dahl, often called Nicolai Dahl (July 17, 1860 – 1939) was a Russian

Russians

The Russian people are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Russia, speaking the Russian language and primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries....

 physician

Physician

A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...

. He graduated from the Moscow University

Moscow State University

Lomonosov Moscow State University , previously known as Lomonosov University or MSU , is the largest university in Russia. Founded in 1755, it also claims to be one of the oldest university in Russia and to have the tallest educational building in the world. Its current rector is Viktor Sadovnichiy...

 in 1887, and was a studied in France with Charcot

Jean-Martin Charcot

Jean-Martin Charcot was a French neurologist and professor of anatomical pathology. He is known as "the founder of modern neurology" and is "associated with at least 15 medical eponyms", including Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis...

 who initiated a therapy by hypnotizing his patients. Dahl had a private practice in Moscow. His speciality was in the fields of neurology

Neurology

Neurology is a medical specialty dealing with disorders of the nervous system. Specifically, it deals with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of disease involving the central, peripheral, and autonomic nervous systems, including their coverings, blood vessels, and all effector tissue,...

, psychiatry

Psychiatry

Psychiatry is the medical specialty devoted to the study and treatment of mental disorders. These mental disorders include various affective, behavioural, cognitive and perceptual abnormalities...

 and psychology

Psychology

Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...

. Dahl was interested in music and he was a competent amateur cellist.

Dahl is best known for treating the composer Sergei Rachmaninoff

Sergei Rachmaninoff

Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...

. Rachmaninoff had a nervous breakdown

Nervous breakdown

Mental breakdown is a non-medical term used to describe an acute, time-limited phase of a specific disorder that presents primarily with features of depression or anxiety.-Definition:...

 because of poor critical reviews of his Symphony No. 1

Symphony No. 1 (Rachmaninoff)

Symphony No. 1 in D minor, Op. 13, is a music piece by Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff, written at Ivanovka, an estate near Tambov, Russia, between January and October 1895...

 and went into a creative block

Writer's block

Writer's block is a condition, primarily associated with writing as a profession, in which an author loses the ability to produce new work. The condition varies widely in intensity. It can be trivial, a temporary difficulty in dealing with the task at hand. At the other extreme, some "blocked"...

. In January 1900 Dahl took Rachmaninoff into a treatment which lasted daily for more than three months, using hypnotherapy

Hypnotherapy

Hypnotherapy is a therapy that is undertaken with a subject in hypnosis.The word "hypnosis" is an abbreviation of James Braid's term "neuro-hypnotism", meaning "sleep of the nervous system"....

 and psychotherapy

Psychotherapy

Psychotherapy is a general term referring to any form of therapeutic interaction or treatment contracted between a trained professional and a client or patient; family, couple or group...

. Dahl's treatment, helped by support from Rachmaninoff's own family and friends, cured the composer, who dedicated his Piano Concerto No. 2

Piano Concerto No. 2 (Rachmaninoff)

The Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Op. 18, is a concerto for piano and orchestra composed by Sergei Rachmaninoff between the autumn of 1900 and April 1901. The second and third movements were first performed with the composer as soloist on 2 December 1900...

 (1901) to Dahl.

Dr. Dahl is said to have emigrated from Russia in 1925 and to have died in 1939 in Beirut

Beirut

Beirut is the capital and largest city of Lebanon, with a population ranging from 1 million to more than 2 million . Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coastline, it serves as the country's largest and main seaport, and also forms the Beirut Metropolitan...

.

In program booklets from Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra

Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra

The Oslo-Filharmonien is a symphony orchestra based in Oslo, Norway. The orchestra was founded in 1919, and has since 1977 had its home in the Oslo Concert Hall. The orchestra consists of 69 musicians in the string section, 16 in the woodwinds, 15 in brass, 5 in percussionists, 1 harpist, and 1...

 in 1999 and 2001 Dahl is referred to as being Norwegian. This assertion was later disclaimed in an article in the Journal of the Norwegian Medical Association

Journal of the Norwegian Medical Association

The Journal of the Norwegian Medical Association was founded in 1881, five years before the Norwegian Medical Association was established, as the Tidsskrift for praktisk Medicin. The journal changed names in 1888 to Organ for Den norske lægeforening before obtaining its current name in 1890...

.http://www.tidsskriftet.no/pls/lts/pa_lt.visSeksjon?vp_SEKS_ID=465011