Lugansky Nikolai: biography and awards

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:40

This is one of the most sought-after pianists in the world. Lugansky Nikolai is an example of how you can achieve recognition and become famous without introducing colorful elements of the show into your program. He plays in the prestigious halls of the world, and the pianist's tour list is full for more than a year in advance. The repertoire of the intelligent, unfussy master of chamber music includes more than 100 solo programs and about 50 concerts with the orchestra. Nikolai has a dozen prestigious prizes and awards, and in Russia he is an honored and people's artist.

Parents

Nikolai was born in Moscow in 1972. At that time, the eldest son Kirill was already growing up in the Lugansky family. Mom Anna Nikolaevna, graduating from the University. Lomonosov, worked at the Institute of Biochemistry, where she defended her dissertation and became a candidate of biological sciences. Father Lev Borisovich is a man whose life was connected with physics. He worked at the Institute for Physical Problems and had a Ph. D.technical sciences. Cyril was the first of the family to choose a profession related to music. He became a string instrument maker.

My parents loved music. Lev Borisovich was well versed in opera, and Anna Nikolaevna liked piano classics. They could not even think that their son, Nikolai Lugansky, would become a world-famous pianist in the future.

May there always be sunshine

Lev Borisovich never wanted his son to learn musical notation. The reason for this was their own observations of the children of Luhansk-friendly families. He saw how hard it is for children to learn music, how they sacrifice playing football and other childish pastimes for this.

One day Lev Borisovich bought a tiny piano for his own curiosity and brought it home. When he began to pick up the melody of Arkady Ostrovsky “Let there always be sun” on it, Kolya began to tell his father that he did not hit the notes. Lugansk senior decided to test the child's hearing. He explained that there are 7 notes, if the sound rises by half a tone, then it is, on the contrary, flat. And then he began to press the keys, and Kolya began to guess them.

At the age of 5, 5 years, it was discovered that the child has absolute pitch. From the first time, Nikolai remembered the sound pitch of the notes. This was the reason to buy a real piano.

First teacher

At the age of six, my parents bought a Czech piano "Petroff". In the morning before work, Lev Borisovich explained to his son the meanings of the bass and treble clef, and when he came home in the evening, he was stunned. Kolya playedwith two hands on the piano according to the notes that I saw for the first time. And there were notes in the family, since the eldest son Kirill had already learned musical literacy by this moment.

In one of the interviews, the father recalls the moment when he discovered his son's talent. He says: “I press 5 notes, Kolya, without seeing the keyboard, lists them with accuracy. When I play a chord with both hands, my son calls all 10 notes again.”

Of course, such a gift required development, so the parents turned to their dacha neighbor Sergei Alexandrovich Ipatov to take their son to study. He was a talented musician who had a conservatory behind him. At first, he was skeptical about the proposal, but when Nikolay Lugansky, in the presence of Sergei Alexandrovich, sat down at the instrument and began to pick up Beethoven's 20th sonata by ear, it became obvious that the boy was really gifted.

Attitude towards music

The first discs with classical works from little Kolya were "Chopin's Ballads and W altzes" and "Beethoven's Sonatas". Nikolai Lugansky (photos of crowded halls from whose concerts prove the nationwide love of the public), as a five-year-old child, even then experienced incredible sensations from listening to the final chords of the Moonlight Sonata.

Giving an interview, he said that at that time he was no longer a direct child: “I knew what war was, I heard about death, destruction. Father told the principle of the neutron bomb, which the Americansdeveloped by that time. But all the existing world problems, catastrophes were so insignificant compared to what a musically vivid impression the finale of the Moonlight Sonata made on me. Music for him was and remains more important than life.

Music school and conservatory

Nikolay studied at the Central Music School (CMS) with T. E. Kesner. Then Lugansky entered the conservatory, where the Soviet composer and pianist Tatyana Petrovna Nikolaeva became his teacher, after whose death he passed under the pedagogical wing of S. L. Dorensky. Under the guidance of the last of the listed teachers, Lugansky Nikolai Lvovich completed an assistantship-internship, which allowed him to teach piano at the Moscow Conservatory since 1998.

In a conversation with reporters, he was asked if he sees any special gift in his students that can lead them to the big stage. To which Nikolai Lugansky, a pianist from the galaxy of the best musicians, replied: “When a person begins to win in all competitions, there are people who say that they saw talent and predicted a great future for this person, although until the moment of his recognition, never to anyone it was not reported. And then Nikolai drew a parallel with his teachers and said: “All my teachers are different, and they never advertised themselves at the expense of the talent of their students.”

Victory and concerts

In 1988, at a competition in Tbilisi, for the first time they said: “Nikolai Lugansky (piano), Moscow -Winner of the 1st All-Union Competition for Young Musicians. This award was the first in a long list of his victories. In the same year, in Leipzig, Lugansky became a laureate of the International Tchaikovsky Competition. I. S. Bach.

At the age of 16, he and Tatyana Petrovna were invited to Cannes for a Mozart concert. And two years later (1990) Nikolai visited Paris not as a contestant, but as a soloist in a concert program. After his first solo performance in France, Nikolai Lugansky began to give concerts all over the world. He was applauded by the public of the Netherlands, Germany, Greece, Switzerland, Spain, Japan. But Nikolai Lvovich does not forget about the Russian people, who need to receive "cultural pleasure". Every year the maestro comes to Ivanovo to the museum-estate of his favorite composer and performer S. V. Rachmaninov, where he gives charity concerts.

By the way, the first prize at the competition. S. V. Nikolai received Rachmaninov in 1990 in Moscow. In preparation for the performance, he memorized 17 etudes by the great Russian composer Sergei Vasilyevich.

Nikolay Lugansky has three German awards: for the best instrumental performance; for the best chamber performance and from the critics for the recording of Rachmaninov's concertos. In 2013, Nikolai Lvovich was awarded the title of People's Artist of the Russian Federation.

Nikolai Lugansky: personal life, hobbies

The in-demand pianist doesn't have much time left for his personal life. Constant tours, flights take half the time that Nikolai is forced to spend outside the home.

Sohe met his wife Lada at a friend's party. She is a pharmacist by education, and by vocation she is a wife patient with the constant absence of her husband. The couple have three children.

After the performances, upon returning home, Nikolai loves to play football and tennis with his eldest son. Of the quieter games, chess occupies an important place among the pianist's hobbies. The favorite game in this sport is Swedish, when two pairs compete and the piece “eaten” from the opponent is transferred to the partner, who rearranges it on his board.

Life story

There are funny cases in the life of a brilliant chamber performer. In one interview, the parents told how, having played the program in the Canary Islands, Nikolai decided to swim in the Atlantic Ocean the next day.

When he came to the beach, he did not find a single vacationer, but this did not prevent him from taking a step towards the water. He swam, but could not return to the shore, because the low tide threw Nikolai back into the ocean. And the water temperature was very low. Miraculously, someone from the nearest cafe called for help, the pianist was saved. It's good that such a risky act turned out to be the salvation of Nikolai for the Lugansky family.