Moscow born Alexander Melnikov began his musical education at the Central School of Music in Moscow when he was just six years old; he continued his studies at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory Moscow, from which he graduated in 1997 under Professor Lev Naumov.
From there, his studies led Melnikov to Elisso Wirssaladze at the Munich University of Music and Performing Arts and to the Fondazione per il Pianoforte (Lake Como), where Andreas Staier and Carl-Ulrich Schnabel were among his instructors.
He began participating with great success in international piano competitions while still in school; to list just two, he was an awardee of the 1989 Schumann Competition in Zwickau as well as of the Concours Reine Elisabeth 1991 in Belgium. His international career took off soon afterwards.
Alexander Melnikov collaborates with orchestras of international renown such as the Russian National Orchestra and the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra under Mikhail Pletnev, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra and the Philadelphia Orchestra under Charles Dutoit, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra under Valery Gergiev, the St. Petersburg Philharmonic under Yuri Temirkanov, the Moscow Soloists under Yuri Bashmet, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the NHK Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra.
He also plays the fortepiano, performing on a regular basis with the Baroque music chamber ensemble Concerto Köln as well as with Philippe Herreweghe.
Melnikov gives numerous solo performances in the great concert halls -- the Concertgebouw, the Suntory Hall, the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, the Théâtre Musical de Paris Le Chatelet, and the Queen Elizabeth Theatre, to name a few. He was and is artistically close to the late Sviatoslav Richter, who invited him regularly to festivals in Moscow (December Nights) and to his chamber music festival in La Grange de Meslay (a historical fortified farm near Tours, France).
Chamber music has an important position in the pianist's work; from 1993 to 2003 he often performed with Vadim Repin, and his current collaboration with Isabelle Faust is very successful. Apart from Repin and Faust, Melnikov has also played with Natalia Gutman, Yuri Bashmet, Alexander Rudin, Pieter Wispelwey, and Jean-Guihen Queyras. He regularly performs in piano duos with Andreas Staier, Boris Berezovsky, and Alexei Lubimov.
Alexander Melnikov was invited to join the "BBC New Generation Artist" programme for its 2000 to 2002 cycle, and he is frequently heard on BBC 3 with solo performances, chamber orchestras, and of course the BBC orchestras; with the latter, he has also recorded several albums.
He is currently signed to the Harmonia Mundi label, under which he published several recordings. Among these are works for solo piano by Brahms, Rachmaninov, and Scriabin, and chamber music with Isabelle Faust, Jean-Guihen Queyras, and Teunis van der Zwart. His most recent recordings include the complete set of preludes and fugues for piano by Shostakovich and a collection of all Beethoven sonatas for violin and piano, those together with Isabelle Faust.
Since 2002, Alexander Melnikov is a visiting professor at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester; in his spare time, he loves to fly aircraft.