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Gergiev, born in Moscow, is the son of Tamara Tatarkanovna and Abisal Zaurbekovich. He had his first piano lessons in secondary school before going on to study at the Leningrad Conservatory from 1972 to 1977. His principal conducting teacher was Ilya Musin one of the greatest conductor-makers in Russian musical history.

In 1978, he became assistant conductor at the Kirov Opera, now the Mariinsky Opera, under Yuri Temirkanov, where he made his debut conducting Sergei Prokofiev's War and Peace. He was chief conductor of the Armenian Philharmonic Orchestra from 1981 to 1985.

In 1991, for the first time, Gergiev conducted a western European opera company with the Bavarian State Opera in a performance of Modest Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov in Munich. In the same year, he made his American début, performing War and Peace with the San Francisco Opera. Since then, he has conducted both operatic and orchestral repertoire across the world. He also participates in numerous music festivals, including the White Nights in St. Petersburg.
He became chief conductor and artistic director of the Mariinsky in 1988, and overall director of the company, appointed by the Russian government, in 1996. In addition to his artistic work with the Mariinsky, Gergiev has worked in fundraising for such projects as the recently built 1100-seat Mariinsky Hall.

From 1995 to 2008, Gergiev was principal conductor of the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. In 1997, he became principal guest conductor of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. In 2003, he initiated and conducted at the Mariinsky Theatre the first complete cycle of Wagner's The Ring of the Nibelung to be staged in Russia for over 90 years. The production's design and concept reflects many aspects of Ossetian culture. Gergiev is scheduled to become chief conductor of the Munich Philharmonic in 2015.

In 1999, Gergiev married the musician Natalya Dzebisova, who is 27 years his junior and also a native Ossetian. They have three children, two boys and a girl. From time to time he has been reported to be a friend of Vladimir Putin, and they have been said to be godfathers to each other's children. But in a letter to The Daily Telegraph, he rejected the notion that he and Putin were each other's children's godfathers. From his past relationship with the language teacher Lena Ostovich, he has a daughter, Natasha.
Source: Wikipedia

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