Максим Дунаевский, born on January 15, 1945, in Moscow, was a Soviet and Russian composer and pianist. The son of composer Isaak Dunayevsky and ballerina Zoya Ivanovna Pashkova, he began his career as the conductor of the Vakhtangov Theater from 1969 to 1974. He later served as the chief conductor and music director of the Moscow Music Hall from 1974 to 1975 and the State Pop Orchestra of the RSFSR from 1985 to 1987. He organized his own pop ensemble, "Festival," which played from 1977 to 1990. He collaborated with notable poets such as Leonid Derbenyov and Ilya Reznik, contributing to several films, including The Car, the Violin, and the Dog Klyaksa (1974) and "D'Artagnan and Three Musketeers" (1978). He lived in the USA from 1992 to 1999. He was awarded the Order of Honour in 2019 for a great contribution to the development of domestic culture and art, and the Order For Merit to the Fatherland, 4th degree, in 2026.
