The world-famous pianist, conductor and composer MIKHAIL PLETNEV (1957) is a prominent figure in contemporary musical art. Born in Arkhangelsk, then part of the Soviet Union into a musical family, he began studying piano at the age of 7 with Kira Shashkina at the Special Music School of the Kazan Conservatory, before entering the Moscow Central Music School at the age of 13 in the class of Evgeny Timakin.
After his first success at the International Youth Competition Jeunesses Musicales in Paris (1973), he enrolled at the Moscow Conservatory, where he studied piano with Yakov Flier (after his death he continued with Lev Vlassenko) and composition with Albert Lehmann.
In 1977 he won the All-Union Competition in Leningrad, and the following year the 21-year-old Pletnev received a gold medal at the VI International Tchaikovsky Competition. The prize attracted the attention of the entire musical world. After finishing his studies, he pursued a PhD and became a soloist of the State Concert Agency Gostkontsert. At the same time, he began teaching at the Moscow Conservatory as Vlassenko’s assistant. He gave concerts in the Soviet Union, Europe and the USA in solo recitals and with famous orchestras under the batons of Claudio Abbado, Bernard Haitink, Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta, Kurt Sanderling, Neeme Järvi, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Mstislav Rostropovich, Rudolf Barshai, Valery Gergiev and others.
In 1980 he made his debut as a conductor. Ten years later, in 1990, he founded and became the chief conductor of the Russian National Orchestra, the first non-governmental orchestra in Russia since 1917, bringing together quality musicians from all over the country. He developed it into one of Russia’s finest orchestras. With him they gave concerts and made recordings with an extensive repertoire – works by J. S. Bach, Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Liszt, Wagner, Mahler, Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Scriabin, Ravel, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Shostakovich and others, as well as complete works recordings of the Tchaikovsky and Beethoven.
As a guest conductor Pletnev has worked with the London Symphony Orchestra, the Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Mariinsky and Bolshoi Theatre orchestras, Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra, Berlin Symphony Orchestra, Staatskapelle – Dresden, Kremerata Baltica, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Basel Symphony Orchestra and Basel Chamber Orchestra, Budapest and Verbier Festival Orchestras, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, etc.
In 2007, he made his debut as an opera conductor in the new production of Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades at the Bolshoi Theatre and was nominated for the Golden Mask Award. With the Russian National Orchestra he gave concert performances of Bizet’s Carmen, Mozart’s The Magic Flute, Rachmaninoff’s Aleko and Francesca da Rimini, May Night by Rimsky-Korsakov, etc.
In 2008-2010 he was guest conductor of the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana, and since 2015 he has been guest conductor emeritus of the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra. In the late 1990s, he remained as Executive Director of the National Russian Orchestra until 2022. Dismissed from that post because of his stance on the Russian military invasion of Ukraine, he formed another ensemble, the Rachmaninoff International Orchestra.
Since 1996 Mikhail Pletnev has lived in Switzerland and like any great artist is a citizen of the world. He is an outstanding interpreter of a vast repertoire as a pianist and conductor. He has an extensive discography with over 100 releases. His benchmark performances include the piano works and concertos of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff. His recordings have won numerous awards such as: “Gramophone for its release of sonatas by Domenico Scarlatti (1996), ECHO Klassik for keyboard works by Scriabin (1999), and the album Pletnev Live at Carnegie Hall (2001), “Grammy in the category of Best Chamber Music Performance for his recordings with Martha Argerich of Prokofiev’s piano suite Cinderella for two pianos (transcription by Pletnev) and Ravel’s Ma mere l’Oye (2005).