Biography:

Levon Sarkisovich (Leonty Sergeevich [ 2 ] ) Oganezov (also performed under the name Leon Oganezov ; December 25, 1940 [ 1 ] , Moscow  – December 13 , 2025 , New York City , New York ) was a Soviet and Russian pianist , composer , accompanist , actor , and television presenter. People’s Artist of the Russian Federation (2010) [ 3 ] .

Born December 25, 1940 in Moscow ; according to other sources, in Perovo , then a satellite town of the capital [ 4 ] . His father, Sarkis Artemovich Oganezov, was a shoemaker [ 5 ] , and his mother, Mariam Sergeevna Oganezova (née Karumova), was a housewife [ source not specified for 1048 days ] . He was the sixth child in the family; according to him, he was born because of the ban on abortions that came into force in 1936 [ 6 ].

Levon himself considered himself “a purebred Armenian, albeit with a small note – a Georgian Armenian ” [ 4 ] [ 7 ] . They spoke Georgian in the house, and Levon “understood” the Armenian language [ 8 ] .

He studied at the Central Music School . He began his stage career in childhood. According to family legend, Joseph Stalin himself was present at one of the concerts where Levon performed as a child ; the leader was sitting in a box separated from the rest of the hall by a curtain, and therefore was invisible to the audience, but accidentally ended up in a photo taken by the pianist’s father [ 9 ] . He graduated from the Ippolitov-Ivanov Music College , then in 1967 from the Moscow Conservatory in piano [ 2 ] [ 10 ] . He won several piano competitions [ 10 ] . From 1959 he worked at Mosconcert [ 2 ] .

At the age of 18, he replaced Naum Walter at a concert in the Column Hall of the House of Unions [ 11 ] , where he accompanied the tenor Mikhail Alexandrovich [ 8 ] . From then on, he began performing on stage. He worked with such artists as Klavdiya Shulzhenko , Oleg Anofriev , Valentina Tolkunova , Iosif Kobzon , Andrei Mironov , Vladimir Vinokur , Larisa Golubkina , Yan Osin , and Maxim Galkin .

He was a co-host of the television programs ” The White Parrot Club “, “The Fuss Around the Piano”, “Good Evening with Igor Ugolnikov” (1997) and ” Life is Beautiful “. He starred in several films. He was an equal participant in Vladimir Vinokur’s play “I’m Going Out Alone…” (written by Arkady Arkanov , directed by Alexander Shirvindt ); as an actor, he participated in the Moscow Satire Theater’s play “Farewell, Master of Ceremonies!” [ 2 ] . He was a laureate of the ” Golden Ostap ” award for humor in music (1998) [ 2 ] .

In 2007, in collaboration with Alexander Khaminsky, he patented the model “Electric Keyboard Musical Instrument”, which has a function for changing the keyboard layout, which allows it to be used by both right-handed and left-handed performers [ 12 ] ․

Illness and death

He died on December 13, 2025 [ 13 ] [ 14 ] in New York [ 15 ] , USA, where he lived for the last decades and was undergoing treatment for a severe form of kidney cancer [ 16 ] . Levon Oganesov died less than two weeks before his 85th birthday [ 11 ] [ 6 ] [ 17 ] .

The pianist’s funeral will take place on the morning of December 16 in New York City . He will be buried at Kensico Cemetery in Walhalla , Westchester County [ 18 ] , where composer Sergei Rachmaninoff is also buried .

Credits: