Sophie Lacaze : Associate Artist
Random Audio Sample: Jetez-vous sur l'avenir : mezzo-soprano voice with chamber ensemble by Sophie Lacaze, from the CD Sophie Lacaze.
Photo: Guy Bompais
Artist website: http://www.sophielacaze.com/
Born in Lourdes (France) in 1963, Sophie Lacaze studied music at the Conservatoire de Toulouse, and continued at the Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris, where she received the Composition Prize. Afterwards, she studied with Allain Gaussin, Philippe Manoury and Antoine Tisne in France, and with Franco Donatoni and Ennio Morricone in Italy. She also engaged in music theatre with Georges Aperghis at the Centre Acanthes, and attended Pierre Boulez's courses in College de France.
She is now developing a partnership with ensembles and soloists in various countries, and also with primary schools to introduce children to contemporary music.
Lacaze's music is performed in leading festivals throughout Australia, Belgium, Brazil, France, Japan, Poland, Roumania, Ukrainia, and in England, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Switzerland, by distinguished ensembles and artists such as the Orchestre de Perpignan – Mediterranee and the Camerata de France (conductor Daniel Tosi), Mihail Jora Philarmonic Orchestra (conductor Ovidiu Balan), Orchestre de Flutes Francais (conductor Pierre-Alain Biget), musicians of the Orchestre National de Lyon, Aperto Trio, Arcadie Flute Quartet, Aujourd'hui Musiques Ensemble, Canberra New Music Ensemble, Helios Quartet, Pro Contemporania Ensemble, Settembrini Trio, Pierre-Yves Artaud, Ivan Bellocq, Jean-Claude Gerard, Baudoin Giaux, Daniel Kientzy, Marie Kobayashi, Aino Lund, Kiyoko Okada, Christel Rayneau, Gabriella Smart, Chiharu Tachibana, Fuminori Tanada, Francoise Vanhecke, Stephen Whittington.
Other collaborations are in progress with the Parisii String Quartet, the Trio à Cordes de Paris, the Nouvel Orchestre de Chambre de Rouen, French pianist Daniel Isoir and Japanese soprano Yumi Nara.
Lacaze's music has been recorded on several CDs (Maguelone, REM, Galun Records, Gaudeamus-Roumania).
Unsubdued but attentive to musical trends and schools, Sophie has developed an original aesthetics that takes into account the current research on sounds while looking to restore music to its primary functions, ie ritual, incantation, dance, and its links with nature.
"Independence of spirit and style, heartfelt expression, a natural aspiration toward refinement, a clear taste for a merging of words and music, like stage music but without over-dramatisation or redundancy, a natural curiosity driving an interest in all forms of art and all genuine artists, make Sophie Lacaze a sensitive, astute composer, an artist whose main objective is to offer listeners the resonance of the inner music created by her particularly attractive form of sensitivity and refinement."
J.A. Kobiela, composer and musical critic, 1996.
Biography provided by the composer — current to January 2007