Romain Guyot and Chamber Orchestra of Europe
Biography Romain Guyot and Chamber Orchestra of Europe
Romain Guyot
At the age of 16, Romain Guyot was appointed for three years principal clarinet of the European Union Youth Orchestra, conducted by Claudio Abbado. He studied at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique in Paris, graduating with two first prizes, in clarinet and chamber music. At the age of 22, he was appointed first principal clarinet at the Orchestre National de l’Opera de Paris. In 1996, he won the prestigious Young Concert Artist International Auditions in New-York, one of the highest honours for young talent. In 2001, he resigned from the Orchestre National de l’Opera de Paris. In 2003, Claudio Abbado and Daniel Harding asked him to be the principal clarinet of the Malher Chamber Orchestra (MCO), position he held until 2006. In 2008, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe (COE) choose him to be their new solo clarinetist. In 2009 he is appointed teacher in Geneva Conservatoire Superieur (HEM). Romain Guyot plays solo concerts across Europe, Japan, Korea, South-America and Usa. He performed the clarinet concertos with the English Chamber Orchestra, the Sinfonia Varsovia, the Tokyo Mozart Players, the Osaka Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonic de Radio-France, the Ulster BBC Orchestra... in many of the world’s major concert halls including, New York (92nd Street Y; Alice Tully Hall) – Washington (Kennedy Center, Library of Congress) – Tokyo (Suntory Hall) – Seoul (Arts Center) - Amsterdam (Concertgebouw) – Berlin (Philharmonie) – St Petersburg (Philharmonie)... He won the ARD competition in Munich with the Debussy Wind Quintet and is member of the Paris-Bastille Wind Ensemble with François Leleux (oboe), Laurent Lefevre (fagott) and Hervé Joulain (horn). Romain Guyot is teaching at the Mucicalp Academy and the Kyoto Academy, and gives master-classes around the world.
Chamber Orchestra of Europe
Acknowledged as “the finest chamber orchestra in the world” (BBC Two Television, 2011), the Chamber Orchestra of Europe was founded in 1981 by a group of young musicians graduating from the European Union Youth Orchestra. It was their ambition to continue working together at the highest possible professional level, and of that original group, eighteen remain in the current core membership of around sixty. The members of the COE, selected by the Orchestra itself, pursue parallel careers as international soloists, Leaders and Principals of nationally-based orchestras, as members of eminent chamber groups, and as tutors and professors of music.
It is the players’ wealth of cultural backgrounds and shared love of music-making which remain at the heart of their inspired performances, and provide an excellent illustration of how Europeans can come together artistically to create a strong European ethos.
The COE performs in some of the most prominent cultural venues in Europe including the Cité de la musique in Paris, the Opéra de Dijon, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Baden-Baden Festspielhaus, the Cologne Philharmonie and the Alte Oper in Frankfurt. Together with other major European concert halls, these venues form the backbone of the Orchestra’s European Partnership Scheme and provide a regular touring base for the Orchestra. The COE has a close association with the Lucerne Festival, the Styriarte in Graz and with many of the world’s most prestigious musical events, such as the BBC Proms in London, the Edinburgh International Festival and the Mostly Mozart Festival in New York.
The Chamber Orchestra of Europe works with many of the world’s most renowned soloists and conductors including Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Emanuel Ax, Lisa Batiashvili, Joshua Bell, Paavo Berglund, Herbert Blomstedt, Douglas Boyd, Semyon Bychkov, Renaud and Gautier Capuçon, Ivan Fischer, Julia Fischer, Hélène Grimaud, Bernard Haitink, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Daniel Hope, Janine Jansen, Vladimir Jurowski, Leonidas Kavakos, Hanno Müller-Brachmann, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Sir Roger Norrington, Sakari Oramo, Maria Joao Pires, András Schiff, Valeriy Sokolov, Jean-Yves Thibaudet and Mitsuko Uchida.
In only thirty years, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe has recorded over 250 works with all the major recording companies. It has won numerous international prizes for its recordings including three Gramophone Record of the Year awards - for Rossini’s opera Viaggio à Reims, Schubert’s symphonies conducted by Claudio Abbado, and Beethoven’s symphonies conducted by Nikolaus Harnoncourt. The Orchestra has also won two Grammys and the MIDEM “Classical Download” Award. The COE was the first Orchestra to create its own label, “COE Records”, in association with Sanctuary Records, a division of Universal Music. The most recent CDs released by the Orchestra include Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto and Quintet with the COE’s principal clarinet Romain Guyot for the label Mirare and Mozart’s Cosi Fan Tutte with Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Rolando Villazon, Mojca Erdmann, Miah Persson, Angela Brower, Adam Plachetka, Alessandro Corbelli, recorded for Deutsche Grammophon. Future recording projects include Mozart’s Entführung aus dem Serail and a Mendelssohn Symphony Cycle, both with Yannick Nézet-Séguin for Deutsche Grammophon.
In recent years, the COE has released a number of DVDs and in particular has developed a close association with producing companies Idéale Audience and Styriarte/ORF. Idéale Audience produced two DVDs of concerts performed at the Cité de la musique in Paris, namely Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G, R. Strauss’s Metamorphosen and Bourgeois Gentilhomme Suite conducted by Vladimir Jurowski with Hélène Grimaud and Sibelius’s Rakastava, Valse Triste and Violin Concerto and Schumann’s Symphony No. 1 conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy with Ukrainian violinist Valeriy Sokolov. The Styriarte, in association with the ORF (Austria’s Radio and Television network), also released three DVDs of the COE’s performances at the Styriarte Festival, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis in D and Symphony No. 5 (2007) and Smetana’s Má Vlast (2010) and The Bartered Bride (2011).
To enable young people and new audiences to experience at first hand high quality live orchestral and chamber music, the COE has an active education and outreach programme designed for school, conservatoire and concert hall. The COE Academy was created in 2009 and each year awards full scholarships to exceptionally talented postgraduate students and young professionals to study with the COE’s principal players when the Orchestra is ‘on tour’.
The COE has been a European Cultural Ambassador since 2007 and benefits from substantial support from the EU Culture Programme. It also attracts support from other organisations, most notably from The Gatsby Charitable Foundation.
