About
Described by Gramophone as "the most trailblazing and meteoric performer of all" Nikolai Lugansky is a pianist of extraordinary depth and versatility.
Concerto highlights for the 2016/17 season include his debuts with both the Berliner Philharmoniker and Wiener Symphoniker; return engagements with the Philharmonia Orchestra, St Petersburg Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, Philadelphia Orchestra, St Louis Symphony and the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony. Lugansky continues his cycle of all of Prokofiev’s piano concertos with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the orchestra and birth of the composer.
Upcoming recital performances include the Alte Oper Frankfurt, London’s Wigmore Hall, Paris’ Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Geneva, Budapest, the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatoire and the Great Hall of the St Petersburg Philharmonia. Lugansky regularly appears at some of the world's most distinguished festivals, including in the coming season, La Roque d’Anthéron, Verbier, Tanglewood and Ravinia.
An award winning recording artist, Nikolai Lugansky’s recital CD featuring Rachmaninov's Piano Sonatas won the Diapason d’Or and an ECHO Klassik Award while his recording of concertos by Grieg and Prokofiev with Kent Nagano and the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin was a Gramophone Editor’s Choice. His earlier recordings have also won a number of awards, including a Diapason d'Or, BBC Music Magazine Award and ECHO Klassik prize. Lugansky’s most recent disc of Schubert C minor sonata and Impromptus D.935 was released in 2016. A new recording of Tchaikovsky’s Grande Sonata and The Seasons is due for release in early 2017.
Lugansky is Artistic Director of the Tambov Rachmaninov Festival and is also a supporter of, and regular performer at, the Rachmaninov Estate and Museum of Ivanovka.
Nikolai Lugansky studied at Moscow’s Central Music School and the Moscow Conservatoire where his teachers included Tatiana Kestner, Tatiana Nikolayeva and Sergei Dorensky. He was awarded the honour of People’s Artist of Russia in April 2013.