Alexei Sultanov

Aleksey Sultanov (August 7, 1969, Tashkent, Uzbek SSR, USSR - June 30, 2005, Fort Worth, USA) - Russian and American pianist (US citizenship since 2004). Aleksey Sultanov was born in the family of famous musicians Fayzulhak Abdulhakovich Sultanov and Natalya Mikhailovna Pogorelova. The grandson of the famous Uzbek actress Zamira Khidoyatova. There is a younger brother Sergey. From the age of four, Sultanov studied at the Republican School of Music with a teacher Tamara Popovich. For the first time, Aleksey entered the stage at the age of 7, performing with Mozart's Concert No. 28 with the orchestra. Concerted from the age of 8. At 15, he became a laureate of the Komsomol Prize of Uzbekistan. He entered the Moscow Conservatory in the class of Lev Naumov. In 1986, at the VIII International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, 16-year-old Alexei Sultanov was the favorite of the competition. An hour before the draw during the game, Aleksey dropped the piano lid on his hand - the doctor noted a broken finger. Sultanov decided to play, behind the scenes the doctor did anesthesia. The conservatory immediately spread: "Some boy is playing a program with a broken finger! They do him anesthesia, like a football player. " The audience, learning about what happened, all two rounds clapped for a long time after the performances. The jury, however, decided that one should not risk his hand and removed the musician from the finale. In 1989, he won the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, after which he received a huge number of tour invitations. In 1990, he left the third year of the conservatory, in 1991 he moved to the United States. In the future, Sultanov twice participated in major international competitions, and both times this participation was accompanied by a scandal. In 1995, the jury of the Chopin Piano Competition decided to award the second prize to Sultanov, and not to award the first; Sultanov refused to receive a second degree diploma, after which a 26-year-old pianist suffered a stroke. In 1998, the jury of the Tchaikovsky International Competition considered the performance by Sultanov of the Seventh Sonata S. S. Prokofiev unnecessarily free and temperamental and did not allow him to enter the third round, which caused a sharp reaction from the press. In 2001, Sultanov suffered a second stroke with paralysis of the left side of the body. He continued to give charity concerts in which his wife, cellist Dace Abele, who performed the parts of the left hand, helped him. June 30, 2005 passed away at the age of 35 years.