Program :
Bach Suite no 1
Reger suite no 1
Vieuxtemps capriccio
Interval
Bach 2nd Suite
Bach Chromatic Fantasy
Connie is a dynamic British violist, captivating audiences across Europe as a soloist, chamber musician and orchestral leader.
Her extensive experience in chamber music is complemented by a passion for curating collaborative concerts. Her artistic and conceptual approach has been largely influenced by notable musicians encountered at festivals and residencies including Heidelberger Fruling, Yellow Barn, Ozawa Academy, Mendelssohn on Mull, AIMS Academy, Lac Leman, Llandtwitt, Stamford, Gstaad Festival, and Zermatt Music Festival. Connie’s performances at the 2019 and 2022 IMS Prussia Cove seminar concerts led to her regular participation in IMS Open Chamber Music sessions. A highlight of Connie’s recent achievements was her solo performances at the Schiermonnikoog festival, which promted an invitation to perform at Het Concertgebouw. Furthermore, Connie features on the recently released album “Soliloquies” alongside Maria Hegele and Anna Szalucka, interpreting Frank Bridge’s Songs for voice, viola, and piano.
Based in Amsterdam, Connie is a member of the Marigold Piano Quartet, who recently took the Netherlands by storm, with performances at the Concertgebouw, Muzeikgebouw and multiple features on the Dutch classical Radio 4. The quartet, known for their passionate and sincere approach to chamber music, embraces works from various periods and frequently performs as a string trio. Connie enjoys playing across a spectrum of groups, ranging from chamber to symphony orchestras. She has regular engagements with renowned orchestras such as the Amsterdam Sinfonietta, O’Modernt Chamber Orchestra, Concertgebouw Orchestra, 12 Ensemble, Netherlands Chamber Orchetsra and Netherlands Radio Philharmonic. Connie founded the Seida Ensemble, a string orchestra formed of compelling and progressive musicians based in Britain and Europe. Together with Emily Turkanik and Raphael Papo, Connie directs Seida Ensemble who recently launched their venture ‘music@work’ and who’s musicians have a drive to push the boundaries of their artistic potential and a passion for communicating to a variety of audiences and communities.
Connie’s musical journey includes past roles as the violist for the Ebenos and Serpentine Ensembles, exploring a fusion of wind and string repertoire. Her diverse experiences extend to performances at Wigmore Hall with the RCM Chamber Musicians and premiering contemporary chamber music with the Echo Ensemble. Beyond classical realms, Connie showcases her versatility as a violinist, having played in the Capital Orchestra and engaging with popular and jazz culture alongside emerging artists. Her involvement with popular artists and producers, including Max Richter, Joy Crookes, Max Pope, Hilts, and Ezra Lloyd Jackson, reflects her interest in composing and collaborative exploration. Connie actively supports Sarcoma UK through fundraising initiatives. Noteworthy events include a solo recital in London in March 2019, a christmas online performance with Bryony Gibson-Cornish and a virtual concert of Britten’s Lachrymae with Bradley Wood in 2020.
Connie began playing the violin and viola when she earned a place at the Royal Academy of Music to study the violin and viola under Erica Graigner de Sa and Jacky Woods, respectively. Whilst there her accolades included the John McAslan Violin Prize, Viola Prize, and Lower Strings Prize. She proceeded to study with Andriy Viytovych, Bryony Gibson-Cornish, and Gabrielle Lester at the Royal College of Music, where she graduated with first-class honors. As a principal violist for all college orchestras, Connie garnered recognition with the Viola Prize in her second year and benefited from memorable masterclasses with esteemed musicians such as Lawrence Power, Maxim Rysanov, Antonello Farulli, Isabelle Villanueva, and Jennifer Stumm. Connie graduated from her master’s degree at the Conservatoire van Amsterdam with Nobuko Imai and Marjolein Dispa, with a ‘summa cum laude’ distinction for her final recital.
Connie plays on a Charles Coquet viola and an Emmanuel Carlier bow.
@Philippe Porter
Programme :
Années de pélerinage : l’Italie
Suzana Bartal Biography
Suzana Bartal establishes herself as one of the foremost pianists of her generation. Her playing has been hailed as “brilliant, full of shades and virtuosic” by the Bonner Anzeiger. Recent performances have taken her to prestigious venues such as the big hall of the Paris Philharmonie, the Auditorium of Radio France, the Seine Musicale, Salle Pleyel, the Auditorium of the Musée du Louvre, and the Auditorium of the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Beethoven-Haus Bonn, Merkin Hall in New York, the Wallis Annenberg Center for Performing Arts in Los Angeles, the Palazzetto Bru Zane in Venise, as well as Milton Court in London. Highlights include concerts at the Festival de Pâques Aix-en-Provence, the Rencontres Musicales Evian, the Festival Berlioz, the International Music Festival de Besançon, the Kaposvar Chamber Music Festival in Hungary, Schloss Elmau in Germany and the Turku Music Festival in Finland.
She has made appearances on ARTE Concert, the French radio (Europe 1, France Musique, Radio Classique, Radio France Internationale), the Belgian Radio RTBF3, Rai 3 Radio Italy, RTS Espace 2 Switzerland, the Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR), the Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR), the Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR), the Danish Radio (DR), Radio Klassik Austria, RTÉ Ireland, the Hungarian and Romanian radio, as well as French, Portuguese, Hungarian and Romanian television channels.
After performing on several occasions the complete Liszt “Années de pèlerinage” in three concerts on the same day, her recording of this cycle was released in a triple abum on the label Naïve in March 2020 to praiseful reviews: ““These three perfect discs (…) consacrate the new priestess that the piano of Liszt was awaiting” (Jean-Charles Hoffelé).
Praised by the international critic, the album has received a prize from the Liszt Society in Budapest, as well as “5 stars” from the German magazine Fono Forum, as well as Classical Source UK. It was chosen “CD of the day” on Radio Klassik Austria.
Her most recent CD recording was published in May 2022 on the prestigious label Erato/Warner Classics and includes chamber music works by Eric Tanguy with partners Edgar Moreau, Alexandra Conunova, Lise Berthaud, Pierre Génisson and the Diotima Quartet. This recording was awarded the Diapason d’Or of the Year 2022.
In 2023 she published a duo album with flutist Noémi Győri on the label Hungaroton.
Her first album with solo works by Schumann has been released in March 2016 by Paraty (Harmonia Mundi distribution) and has been warmly received by the critics. The recording was « Coup de coeur » on Radio France Internationale and Bertrand Boissard wrote in the magazine Diapason : “The depth of her touch combines with the richness of the textures (…) the playing is characterized by its softness, seduces by its plasticity (..) assuredly, a musician.”
Suzana has been appointed the new artistic director of the Festival Piano à Riom starting its 34th edition in 2020.
Presently, Suzana Bartal is a piano professor at the Ecole Normale de Musique Alfred Cortot Paris. She is regularly invited to prestigious juries, such as the Liszt Utrecht Competition, the Victoria International Piano Competition Hong Kong, the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et Danse Paris (CNSMDP), the Ecole Normale de Musique Paris, the Schola Cantorum Paris, etc.
She performed under the baton of conductors Marc Minkowski, Christian Vasquez, Eivind Aadland, Marzena Diakun, Ariel Zuckermann, Adrien Perruchon, Roberto Fores Veses, Peter Oundjian, Eero Lehtimäki, Kensho Watanabe, Pieter-Jelle de Boer, with ensembles such as the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Orchestre des Pays de Savoie, Orchestre National d’Auvergne, Orchestre Pasdeloup, the Orchestre National d’Avignon, the Saarbrücken State Orchestra, the Norrlandsoperan Symphony Orchestra, the Joensuu Symphony Orchestra, the Jyväskylä Sinfonia, the Kecskemét Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre Lamoureux or the Madeira Classical Orchestra.
Suzana’s wide range of repertoire reaches from solo works and concertos to chamber music works, all of which she actively and passionately performs. She has given concerts all around the world: in Germany, Holland, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Hungary, UK, Belgium, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Czech Republic, Portugal, France and Romania as well as the US, China and Japan.
Suzana is also an enthusiastic advocate of contemporary music and has worked with some of the most significant composers of our day, such as Thomas Adès, Eric Tanguy and Régis Campo. She performed the world premiere of Tanguy’s “Rhapsodie” for viola and piano with Lise Berthaud at the Festival de Pâques Aix-en-Provence. This premiere was described as being of a “jubilatory virtuosity” by Thierry Hillériteau (Le Figaro). She also collaborated with Oscar-winning film composer Gabriel Yared.
Extremely active as a chamber musician, Suzana has performed with violinists Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Kristóf Baráti, Josef Spacek, Barnabás Kelemen, Alina Pogostkina, Andrey Baranov, Julia Pusker, Rosanne Philippens, Alexandra Conunova, Sayaka Shoji, Alexandra Soumm, Mayu Kishima, Déborah Nemtanu, Geneviève Laurenceau, violists Lise Berthaud, Adrien La Marca and Pierre Lenert, cellists Henri Demarquette, István Várdai, Benedict Klöckner, Claudio Bohorquez, Edgar Moreau and Aurélien Pascal, clarinetists Pierre Génisson and Raphaël Sévère, trumpet/horn player David Guerrier, the Quatuor Diotima, Calder, Adorno, Zaïde and Van Kuijk, as well as the tenor Stanislas de Barbeyrac.
Suzana Bartal was the winner of the New York Concert Artists Concerto Competition in 2013 and has made her NYC debut with orchestra in 2014. She was also the winner of the 2012 Woolsey Concerto Competition. A recipient of the prestigious scholarship from the Yamaha Music Foundation of Europe, Suzana has also been supported by the Fondation Nadia et Lili Boulanger, the ADAMI and the Williamson Foundation.
French-Hungarian pianist Suzana Bartal was born in Timişoara (Romania) and started her musical education in her hometown. Only three years later she became a winner of national and international competitions and gave her first solo recital at the age of 12 and had her first concerto apparition at the age of 13. In 2005 she decided to move to France where she studied with Denis Pascal, Pierre Pontier and Florent Boffard in Paris and in Lyon at the CNSMD. Between 2011 and 2014, Suzana has perfected her skills at the Yale School of Music under the guidance of Peter Frankl. She received her Doctorate of Musical Arts from Yale and was awarded the Harriet Gibbs Memorial Prize for excellency in studies. In 2013 – 2014 Suzana has been a Teaching Fellow at the Yale College.
Many distinguished artists have influenced Suzana’s musical and artistic development, such as: Sir András Schiff, Leon Fleisher, Paul Lewis, Menahem Pressler, Jean-Claude Pennetier or Matti Raekallio, as well as the Ysaÿe Quartet, the Tokyo String Quartet or the Emerson Quartet. She has been invited to take part in the very selective International Musician’s Seminar in Prussia Cove (UK).
Program :
Félix Mendelssohn – Trio n°1 en ré mineur
Arenski – Trio n°1 en ré mineur
Enescu – sérénade lointaine
Trio Biography
The Parhélie is a rare and fleeting meteorological phenomenon that occurs when the sun’s rays, low on the horizon, pass through a cloud of ice crystals; thanks to a phenomenon of light refraction, three stars appear to appear in a solar halo. The Parhélie Trio incorporates this founding idea as the matrix of its aesthetic; it interprets works in terms of lighting, color, and reverberation, which pushes it to constantly question
its interpretation and its perspective on the repertoire.
The Parhélie Trio, a member of the CNSMD in Paris, is in residence at the Singer-Polignac Foundation and at the European Center for Chamber Music ProQuartet.
Spotted in 2023 during the Lyon International Competition, the trio was invited by Vincent Coq (Trio Wanderer) to participate in a residency at the La Roque d’Anthéron Festival.
Since then, they have regularly performed at various renowned festivals and academies such as La Chaise-Dieu, Jeunes Talents, Les Pianissimes, Les Automnales du Château de Compiègne, and more. The trio will also make their Chinese debut in the summer of 2025 with a three-week tour.
The Parhélie Trio won first prize at the FNAPEC European Competition, the Piano Trio Prize at the ISA Festival (Austria), and was a finalist at the Lyon International Chamber Music Competition in 2023. For its various projects, the Parhélie Trio is supported by the Société Générale Foundation “C’est vous l’avenir” (It’s You the Future), Catherine Delepelaire, and via ProQuartet, Crédit Agricole Ile-de-France, as well as the Peters family.
Individual Biographies
Lilya Chifman began learning the violin at the age of 4 and joined the Conservatoire de Paris (Regional Conservatory of Music), where she studied with Larissa Kolos and Florin Szigeti until the Concert Cycle. At 16, she won first prize at the Vatelot-Rampal Competition, then first prize at the Académie Internationale de Flaine. She subsequently joined Marianne Piketty’s class at the CNSMDL (National Conservatory of Music).
In 2021, the CNSMDL offered her her first opportunity to perform as a soloist in Prokofiev’s First Concerto at the Auditorium de Lyon, accompanied by the Conservatoire Orchestra conducted by Alexandre Bloch. Since then, she has regularly performed as a soloist with other orchestras, notably with the Echo Philharmonic Orchestra, with which she has performed Mendelssohn’s Second Concerto and the Beethoven Concerto.
Lilya has also been admitted to the Jaroussky Academy for the 2022/2023 academic year (Debussy class) and is studying with Nemanja Radulovic. She plays a Galen Hartley violin made in 2022 and is receiving an ADAMI scholarship.
Cellist Enguerrand Bontoux was drawn to chamber music at an early age; at the age of 16, he formed the Bellefeuille Quartet at the CRR de Boulogne-Bt, with which he performed at numerous festivals in France, Belgium, Italy, and at venues such as the Philharmonie de Paris. He then studied with Anne Gastinel at the CNSMDL, where he founded the Trio Parhélie, and obtained his Master’s degree in cello unanimously with honors.
He has performed as a soloist, notably in Beethoven’s Triple Konzert at the CNSMDL with the Parhélie Trio, and in Haydn’s C Concerto with the Colonne Orchestra (conducted by Christophe Coin). He also regularly shares the stage with Raphaël Pidoux and the Cello8 Octet at festivals such as La Folle Journée in Nantes, the Cello Biennäle in Amsterdam, and Les Invalides.
He has also been invited to perform at the Opéra de Lyon, the ONL de Lyon, and the Orchestre National d’Auvergne.
Enguerrand plays a Bernardel Père cello, loaned by the Rosoor family, through the Talents & Violon’celles endowment fund.
Ivan Foucher is a versatile pianist; A true Swiss Army knife, he studied orchestration, composition, analysis (and percussion!) at the CRR de Saint-Maur, where he unanimously received his advanced training award. He then joined the CNSMD de Lyon in David Selig’s class.
Alongside his activities with the Trio Parhélie, of which he was a founding member, he met soprano Yara Kasti. They formed the DuOdyssée, which won awards at the international competitions of Mélodie de Gordes and Mélodie Française de Toulouse. The critically acclaimed duo has been invited to numerous festivals in France, such as Les musicales du lubéron, Présence compositrices, Les saisons de la voix, Jeune Talent, and in venues such as the Opéra de Clermont, the Petit Palais, the Opéra de Massy (recital with Karine Deshayes).
Furthermore, Ivan is also an orchestrator-arranger. In 2023, he made arrangements for the lyrical season of the CNSMD in Lyon, he also collaborated with the vocal ensemble EOS XXI, and made arrangements for the trio Parhélie.