Nikolai Lugansky (Николай Луганский) is a Russian pianist, born on April 26th, 1972 in Moscow. He studied piano at the Moscow Central Music School and the Moscow Conservatory. His teachers included Tatiana Kestner, Tatiana Nikolayeva and Sergei Dorensky.
During the 80's and early 90's, Lugansky won prizes at numerous piano competitions. At the same time he began to make recordings on the Melodiya (USSR) and Vanguard Classics (Netherlands) labels. His performance at the Winners' Gala Concert of the 10th International Tchaikovsky Competition was recorded and released on the Pioneer Classics label, on both CD and video laser disc formats. This was followed by more recordings for Japanese labels. He later recorded for Warner Classics (UK) and Pentatone Classics (Netherlands).
Lugansky has performed together with Vadim Repin, Alexander Kniazev, Joshua Bell, Yuri Bashmet and Mischa Maisky, among others.
In addition, Lugansky has collaborated with conductors such as Riccardo Chailly, Christoph Eschenbach, Vladimir Fedoseyev, Valery Gergiev, Neeme Järvi, Kurt Masur, Mikhail Pletnev, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, Yuri Simonov, Leonard Slatkin, Vladimir Spivakov, Evgeny Svetlanov, Yuri Temirkanov and Edo de Waart.
As well as performing and recording, Lugansky teaches at the Moscow Conservatory.