Alexey Botvinov is a Ukrainian pianist born in 1964 who studied with Serafima Mogilevskaya, Anatoliy Kardashov at the Odesa Conservatory, and Vera Gornostaeva at the Moscow Conservatory. He won laureate honors at the first All-Union Rachmaninoff Competition (1983), the International Bach Competition in Leipzig (1988), and the International Clara Schumann Competition in Düsseldorf (1993).

Botvinov is noted as one of the world’s leading interpreters of Rachmaninoff and has performed Bach’s Goldberg Variations onstage more than 300 times; he was the first Ukrainian musician after independence to record for Deutsche Grammophon. He founded the Odessa Classics international music festival in 2015 and served as artistic director of the Odesa National Academic Theater of Opera and Ballet, remaining an active touring and recording artist including recent Deutsche Grammophon collaborations with violinist Daniel Hope.