Born in St. Petersburg, Russia, Yves Barbotin began playing guitar at 10. Within a couple of years, he formed the rock band Sphinx which soon won the “Soviet Union’s Best Youth Band” competition. At 16, he joined Russia’s celebrated rock band Forum as lead guitarist, where he was half the age of the other musicians. With Forum he toured the country to sold-out audiences and became Laureate of the Song of the Year Festival in 1989, a career-launching annual TV event. After making Canada his new home in 1990, Yves turned his attention away from music for a decade, during which time he studied languages and linguistics. He also worked as a video editor at Leafs TV and NBA TV Canada.  Yves eventually returned to music and began working as a full time film and television composer. In 2000, Yves wrote his first ballet score, The Velveteen Rabbit. Two more ballet commissions followed: The Emperor’s New Clothes and Anastasia. He has since written numerous compositions for film and television series appearing on Discovery and BBC, among many other networks throughout the world. Yves’s music has been performed and recorded by various orchestras including The Russian Philharmonic, The Kitchener Waterloo Orchestra and Symphony Nova Scotia. Yves has a doctorate in composition from the University of Toronto. He is currently working on his own nature series called fraQtal in which he combines his music composition, drone flying and video production passions.