François PINEAU-BENOIS (Paris) 
Violin recital

Paganini and Bach

Saturday 4th May 2024, 7.30pm,
St. Botolph’s Church, TRUNCH

Paganini’s Caprices are widely considered as the most difficult pieces ever written for the solo violin. A beautiful, famous cycle with an enormous arsenal of technical delights.
With his Caprices Niccolò Paganini set out to fascinate the audience and play the kind of music that people had never experienced before. As a young talent Niccolò had shocked and enraged the public by imitating animals using his violin and in the Caprices he elaborated on that earlier experimentation. Birdsong, hunting horns, laughter, donkeys – they were all brought to life through his instrument. Above all Paganini’s caprices are full of drama. Calm and moving passages interchange without warning with fiery, almost violent passages.

For François Pineau-Benois it is not the technical aspects of the music, but exactly that enormous variety in the musical characters, the extraordinary sound landscape, and the fantasy and lyricism that has amazed him all his life and has been an inspiration for this concert. In addition to Paganini, François also will be playing  One Sonata and One Partita by J.-S. Bach. The 2nd Partita is widely known for its Chaconne, considered one of the most masterly and expressive works ever written for solo violin. 

Violinist of the new generation François Pineau-Benois, nicknamed by the international press “French virtuoso”, entered the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (CNSMDP) at the age of 14. He holds master degrees in violin and chamber music from the CNSMDP and also studied with Régis Pasquier at the Ecole Normale de Musique Alfred Cortot. 

François is a laureate of competitive career grants from the Adami (2023), «Culture moves Europe» EU individual mobility grant (2023), the Fondation Banque Populaire and Safran pour la Musique (2017) as well as of the prizes from several competitions: the First Prize (duo) at the International Pro Musici Competition (2019, Paris), the Grand Prix of the International Alexander Glazounov Competition (2017, Paris), the Grand Prix Ciboure of the Ravel Academy (2015, Saint-Jean-de-Luz), the Young Artist Award of the International Leopold Mozart Competition (2013, Augsburg) and others.
A musician with an exceptional sound, he has been invited to play with renowned musicians such as François-René Duchable, Régis Pasquier, Roland Pidoux and young musicians in France, Belgium, Russia, Germany, Spain, Hungary, Israel, United Kingdom, Austria.  
François Pineau-Benois plays the historic Italian violin (XVIII) “Le Genève” of French virtuoso of the beginning of XXth century Lucien Durosoir, graciously lent by the Foundation Musicians between War and Peace. He is professor at the Rachmaninoff Conservatory in Paris.