Over to Lyon this week for a concert by Orchestre de Lyon, led by Christian Arming and featuring violinist David Grimal in a world premier by composer Thierry Escaich, recorded live at Auditorium de Lyon on October 8, 2009 by Radio France Musique.
The program begins with Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony. Followed by Concerto for Violin and Orchestra by Thierry Escaich in its world premier performance. The concert concludes with Sinfonetta by Leos Janacek.
Composer Thierry Escaich was born in Nogent-sur-Marne France, studied organ, improvisation and composition at the Conservatoire de Paris (CNSMDP), where he won eight First Prizes and where he has taught improvisation and composition since 1992.
Together with Vincent Warnier, he was appointed organist of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont church in Paris in 1996 (succeeding Maurice Duruflé). He tours internationally as a performing artist and composer.
His passion for the cinema has led him to improvise on the piano and the organ; he composed music for Frank Borzage’s silent film Seventh Heaven, commissioned by the Louvre in 1999.
He has written more than a hundred works, awarded with the Prix des Lycéens (2002), the Grand Prix de la Musique symphonique from the SACEM in 2004, and on three occasions, in 2003, 2006 and 2011, the French Victoires de la Musique Composer of the Year award.
Although he composes for the organ (solo pieces, chamber music, two concertos, La Barque solaire [The Sun Boat] for organ and orchestra), Escaich is open to all genres, forms and instruments (piano, saxophone).
He wrote a ballet for the New York City Ballet, The Lost Dancer, which was world-premiered in New York City in May 2010 under the title Why am I not where you are (choreography by Benjamin Millepied, scenic designs by Santiago Calatrava).
After being composer in residence with the Orchestre national de Lille, the Orchestre de Bretagne and the Orchestre National de Lyon, he took up his position as associated composer with the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris in September 2011.
His music is performed by orchestras such as the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Berlin Konzerthaus Orchestra, the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra or the Orchestre de Paris, by choirs such as Radio France Choir, the BBC Singers, Sequenza 9.3 and by musicians such as Christoph Eschenbach, Lothar Zagrosek, Jun Märkl, Claire-Marie Le Guay, Paul Meyer, Gautier and Renaud Capuçon, Olivier Latry, Iveta Apkalna, David Grimal, Nora Gubisch, John Mark Ainsley, the Trio Dali, the Trio Wanderer and the Quatuor Voce.
Solo Violin David Grimal pursues an international career as a solo violinist, which has seen him performing regularly over the past twenty years in the world’s leading classical music venues and with prestigious orchestras such as the Orchestre de Paris, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Russian National Orchestra, Orchestre National de Lyon, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Berliner Symphoniker, New Japan Philharmonic, Orchestre de l’Opéra de Lyon, Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra and Sinfonia Varsovia, under the direction of Christoph Eschenbach, Michel Plasson, Michael Schønwandt, Peter Csaba, Heinrich Schiff, Lawrence Foster, Emmanuel Krivine, Mikhail Pletnev, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos and Péter Eötvös, Andris Nelsons, Christian Arming, among others.
Conductor Christian Arming was born in Vienna and later resided in Tokyo until Arming was age two. The family relocated to Hamburg, and then returned to Vienna. He sang with the Vienna Boys Choir as a youth. Christian Arming studied at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, where his conducting teachers included Leopold Hager. Arming was an assistant conductor to Seiji Ozawa and counts Ozawa as a conducting mentor.
Christian Arming’s first orchestral post was as chief conductor of the Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra, Ostrava, from 1996 to 2002. He was subsequently chief conductor of the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra from 2002 to 2004. He was music director of the New Japan Philharmonic from 2003 to 2013, the third conductor in the history of the orchestra to have the title of music director. He was music director of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Liège (OPRL) from 2011 to 2019.
Enjoy the concert.
