Dmitri Novgorodsky was born to a musical family in Odessa, the former USSR. He began to play the piano at age five and was admitted into a special music school for gifted children a year later. After graduating from the studio of Victor Merzhanov at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory with high honors, Novgorodsky immigrated to Israel in 1991. In 1992, he was offered a full scholarship for advanced studies at Yale University School of Music under the tutelage of Boris Berman. Currently, Novgorodsky is the first and the only Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory graduate in Piano Performance to have earned the Doctor of Music Arts in Piano Performance degree from Yale. In 1999, he was granted the Extraordinary Abilities in the Arts permanent US residence, “as one of a small percentage of those who have risen to the top in their field of endeavor”.
Novgordosky has appeared in Russia, Ukraine, Byelorussia, Kazakhstan, Israel, France, Austria, Canada, Spain, Turkey, and Taiwan. In the United States, he has performed at such venues a Carnegie Hall and Steinway Hall (New York City); the Kennedy Center and the Residence of Russian Ambassador of the United States (Washington D.C.); the WLFN Talent Showcase (Philadelphia); the Chazen Museum of Art in Madison, WI (in live broadcast of solo recitals).
Novgorodsky’s pedagogical experiences comprise more than 14 years of university teaching. His former students have continued their graduate studies at Juilliard, Manhattan School of Music, New England Conservatory, Cleveland Institute of Music, Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, University of Colorado Boulder, UW Madison, and the University of Texas at Austin. He has been a piano faculty at Grand Valley State University, University of Wisconsin, and Lawrence University Conservatory of Music.