Andrei Gorbachev is considered one of the foremost virtuosos on the balalaika today.

Born in Voronezh, Russia, Gorbachev began studying the balalaika at age five. In 1988, after completing his early musical training, where he worked with I.V. Inshakov, Gorbachev enrolled in the prestigious Gnessin Russian Academy of Music in Moscow, where he completed graduate and post-graduate studies the guidance of Professor P.I. Necheporenko.

The winner of several prestigious music competitions, Gorbachev has toured extensively, introducing the balalaika to audiences all over the world. Among his many high-profile performances is a concert before Queen Elizabeth II in 1992.

In addition to maintaining a highly successful concert career, Andrei Gorbachev chairs the balalaika department of the Gnessin Academy of music and is also a professor of balalaika performance at the Rachmaninov Tambov State Academy of Music. Founded in 1882 by the Imperial Russian Music Society, it is one of Russia’s oldest musical conservatories.

Since ABS’s founding in 2001, Andrei Gorbachev has performed several times with The American Balalaika Symphony, to the immense pleasure of audiences from all over the greater Washington, D.C. metro area.