Aslan Gotov

Aslan Gotov is a Canadian composer, arranger, orchestrator and pianist of Circassian heritage. His career spans more than four decades across Russia and Canada, moving between classical and orchestral music, jazz, folk, film, theatre and contemporary digital production.

He trained as a concert pianist at the Rostov State Conservatory named after S. V. Rachmaninoff under Professor Kim Nazaretov, graduating in 1993, and went on to complete his postgraduate studies (aspirantura) there, receiving his PhD as a composer and arranger-orchestrator in 1996. In the 1990s he founded and led the ensemble Oshten in Adygea, and in 1997 became a member of the Union of Composers of Russia.

After moving to Moscow in 2002, Gotov worked as deputy director, arranger and orchestrator with the Academic Grand Concert Orchestra named after Yuri Silantiev, creating arrangements and concert programs for major Russian artists — including Joseph Kobzon, Alexander Dobronravov, Arno Babajanyan, Sergey Penkin, Vladimir Troshin and many other composers and singers — and serving as an arranger on Channel One’s Two Stars and Treasure of the Republic.

His own works include orchestral and chamber compositions such as a Piano Concerto, Symphonic Suite and Free Variations on a Folk Theme, exploring the dialogue between Caucasian folk material and contemporary orchestration, as well as music for theatre, ballet and film — including the ballet Hymn to the Rising Sun, the play Medea, and the documentaries Circassian Sultans of Egypt and Cherkeshanka.