Word of him spread the way it always does in small cities: slowly, insistently, like a scent carried on the tram. A music student left a flyer with his number at the conservatory; a café owner brought him a tip jar and a seat by the window. People began to come—students who wanted fingering tips, an old officer who wanted to hear Russian romances, a young father whose son had stopped singing when his mother left. Alexander played for them without looking up, as if the melody were a private thing he reluctantly allowed the world to hear.
Doronin lives in Berlin with his wife, violist Elena Doronina, and their two children. He is famously ascetic in routine:
In 2021, he moved to London as an ABRSM Scholar to study with Dmitri Alexeev Advanced Degrees: