Curriculum Vitae
Having studied the organ and harmony and counterpoint, Pierre-Adrien Charpy devoted himself to composition.
He is open to various musical horizons, equally at ease writing for traditional formations (symphony orchestra, chamber music, vocal ensembles) as for instruments inaccurately termed “early” (renaissance or baroque), for oriental instruments or for electronic. His imagination has been enriched by the meeting with several cultures (in particular his encounter with the Burkinabé balafon player Moussa Hema) which stimulate his profoundly French musical nature.
The Institut de France rewarded him with the Jousselin-Korewo prize (1999) and the André Caplet prize (2001) and the Académie de Marseille with the Jean-Gabriel Marie prize (2005) and the Pierre Barbizet prize (2010).
As he attaches great importance to emotion in performance, he frequently works in close collaboration with the artists of his choice.
He has been composer-in-residence at the conservatoires of Alençon and Aix-en-Provence.
His works are published by Editions Musicales Rubin.
Artistic standpoint
I consider our epoch as one of historical transition, which will perhaps see the flowering of a new culture, both in France and throughout Europe, in the West and throughout the entire world. In this context I try to keep my ears open to all the different traditions and to all that they propose, whilst remaining firmly anchored in my own identity, for I think that exchanging ideas and showing interest in the Other does not mean abandoning one’s own deeply-rooted nature. Regarding the situation of so-called art music in the West, conventionally called “contemporary music”, we are witnessing the slow disintegration of the avant-garde movement, the artistic corollary of materialist thought and of the philosophy of the absurd, and the return of the “neo”-movement: neo-classicism, neo-tonality… My position is neither materialist nor reactionary: I try to be a free man - leading a spiritual life free from any dogmatic context, with an interest in science and the profound changes that it brings about in our perception of the real - as well as an independent artist. I therefore refuse to talk about the “musical language” I use, as I consider the various techniques as tools, and not as aesthetic manifestos.