Emmanuel Pahud

Emmanuel Pahud (born January 27, 1970) is a French-Swiss flute player.

Pahud started to learn the flute at the age of 6 and in 1990 graduated with the Premier Prix from the Paris Conservatoire while studying with Michel Debost before continuing his studies with Aurèle Nicolet.

Pahud has won first prize in many major international music competitions like Kobe in 1989 and Duino in 1988, then won eight out of the twelve special prizes at the Concours de Genève in 1992. He took the Soloists Prize in the World-wide French-speaking Community Radio Awards, and the European Council's Juventus Prize. He is also a laureate of the Yehudi Menuhin Foundation and of the International Tribune for Musicians of UNESCO.

At the age of 22, Pahud was appointed principal flute of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under Claudio Abbado, having previously held the same chairs in Basel and Munich. He was, at the time, the youngest principal in the Berlin orchestra, a position to which he returned in 2002 under Sir Simon Rattle after leaving it in 2000 to take over the virtuosity flute class at the Geneva Conservatory for one year.

Pahud appears regularly at leading festivals throughout Europe, the USA and the Far East. He has appeared as soloist with many of the world's leading orchestras including the Berlin Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Zurich Tonhalle, Bayerischer Rundfunk, Danish Radio, Philharmonique de Radio France, Mariinski, Minnesota Symphony, Camerata Salzburg, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, Washington National Symphony, NHK Symphony, Australian Chamber and Scottish Chamber orchestras. He's collaborated with conductors such as Abbado, Rattle, Zinman, Maazel, Gergiev, Gardiner, Harding, Järvi, Pinnock, Jordan, Rostropovich and Perlman. Fact|He has been acclaimed for his versatility, the beauty of his tone, his innate musicality and his extraordinary technique and flair.|date=April 2008 He is also a regular collaborator in chamber music and along with his regular accompanist Éric Le Sage and clarinet player Paul Meyer was the co-founder of the Musique à L'Emperi festival in France.

Since 1996 he has had a solo recording contract with EMI. His discs include a CD of the Mozart Concertos (including the flute and harp concerto with Marie Pierre Langlamet) with the Berlin Philharmonic under Claudio Abbado, "Paris" (a CD of 20th century French flute music by Poulenc, Milhaud, Sancan, Jolivet, Dutilleux and Messiaen), the Mozart Flute Quartets, Telemann concertos with the Berlin Baroque Soloists, a Bach disc (also with the Berlin Baroque Soloists), the concertos of Khachaturian and Ibert with the Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra under David Zinman, a CD including the Prokofiev sonata and music by Debussy and Ravel, Gubaidulina's Music for Flute, Strings and Percussion with the London Symphony Orchestra under Rostropovich, sonatas by Franck, Strauss and Widor and French chamber music with Paul Meyer, Francois Meyer and Le Sage.

Pahud was named "Instrumentalist of the Year 1997" at the Victoires de la Musique award ceremony in Paris.

In 2005, Pahud collaborated with the NHK Symphony Orchestra, recording the original soundtrack "Komyo ga Tsuji" (功名が辻) to support the NHK Taiga drama series under the same name. The recording was released in Japan under the EMI label in 2006. Tracks where his flute takes the lead include "Diamond Dust Memory ~Winter~" and "Green Breeze ~Spring~". Following this was the release of the Vivaldi Flute Concertos with the Australian Chamber Orchestra led by Richard Tognetti.

Pahud is also a dedicated chamber musician. He has recently toured Europe, North America and Japan in recital with pianists Éric Le Sage, Yefim Bronfman and Hélène Grimaud, as well as jazzing with Jacky Terrasson. Highlights of the coming season include a Japanese tour with Les Vents français, a European recital tour with Hélène Grimaud and recitals in the US with Yefim Bronfman. He has been chosen as "Artiste Étoile" for the 2006 Lucerne Festival and over the next two seasons will be premiering new flute concertos by Matthias Pintscher, Michael Jarrell and Marc-André Dalbavie.

Pahud's discography has earned him many awards, including several TV-Victoires de la Musique, Diapason d'Or, Radio France's "Recording of the Year", several Fono-Forum and TV-Echo awards in Germany, "Record Geijutsu" or "Ongaku no Tomo" award from the Japanese record industry. In 1996 he signed an exclusive solo recording contract with EMI. His discs have all been released to unanimous critical acclaim ("I haven't heard a flautist on disc that I like as much as Pahud" - American Record Guide; "surpassing any previous recordings of the Mozart quartets"- BBC Music Magazine; "this signals the arrival of a new master flautist" - The Guardian; "don't miss any of Pahud's recordings!" – Diapason), and Pahud's collaboration with EMI is set to be one of the most significant contributions to recorded flute music. His most recent releases are a disc with Khatchaturian and Ibert's flute concertos (Zurich Tonhalle with Zinman), a recital disc with harpist Mariko Anraku, and his Franck, Widor and R. Strauss Sonatas with Eric Le sage has been out since the autumn of 2004. In June 2005 he recorded Vivaldi concertos with the Australian Chamber Orchestra which was released in spring 2006.

External links

* [http://www.emiclassics.com/artistbiography.php?aid=21 Emmanuel Pahud Biography] on EMI Classics.
* [http://www.askonasholt.co.uk/Green/Green/home.nsf/Lookup5a/Emmanuel%2BPahud?OpenDocument Emmanuel Pahud Artist's Page] on Askonas Holt Management