CHRISTMAS & NEW YEAR SONGS

Patrick Marco, music at the heart

The choir has always been associated with collective life. More than any other musical form, it was an essential moment of sharing between human beings. The gift of self, the brotherhood exchanged and the altruism are an integral part of the personality of Patrick Marco, bridge between generations. Destiny very early knocked at the door of this musician who was predisposed to choral activity. At the age of ten, impressed by his gifts, Michel Piquemal, one of the masters in the field, already detected in him a passion that never left him. The life of Patrick Marco has indeed been punctuated by the voice or rather by the voices, but what he loves above all else is the communion of beings united in the same fervor. His first experience of choral conducting quickly led him to occupy positions of responsibility which he always assumed with the same enthusiasm and the same enchantment. Director of the Puteaux Conservatory in the Hauts-de-Seine, he was appointed musical director of the choirs of the Orchestre Colonne and of the Maîtrise de Paris in 1980: a mixed group of one hundred and ten students attached to the Conservatoire National de Région de Paris and divided into three choirs recruited from the CM1 class until the baccalaureate. “We have no baccalaureate failure among our children,” he said with justified pride. Endowed with a quicksilver temperament and boundless generosity, this born educator galvanizes a young guard of girls (majority) and boys (fewer in number because of the moulting of the voice). Since 1998, he has been invited to Auvers-sur-Oise by Pascal Escande with a consistency that cannot be denied. This shared loyalty is also shared by a conquered public. Associated as choir director with the musical direction of the Lamoureux Orchestra he obtains, maturity helping, a real recognition by his peers who consider him as one of the most eminent directors of Masters in Europe. Willingly atypical, more concerned with transmission than with assertiveness, he launches headlong into this universe where didactic experience prevails over media unrest. In 1999 Patrick Marco won the Liliane Bettencourt Choral Song Prize awarded by the Academy of Fine Arts and the following year went on a major tour of the United States, where he gave several concerts at American universities. His eclectic journey leads him from the operetta (Le Chanteur de Mexico) to the opera (Pelleas and Mélisande with Georges Prêtre) or to the edition of “Chansons de France” at Gallimard Jeunesse which obtains, with the Maîtrise de Paris, the Coup de Coeur of the Charles-Cros Academy. Without forgetting the double “live” CD published by DiscAuverS, composed of the most beautiful musical moments sung at the Auvers-sur-Oise Festival. For its thirty-fifth edition, the concert he gave on June 12th, 2015 at the Auvers-sur-Oise Festival, was unforgettable! With charisma and passion, he led his choral forces to the pinnacle of intensity in the most beautiful pages that made the unique history of this Masters who also blew his 35 candles in 2015! Michel Le Naour

The Maîtrise de Paris

The Maîtrise de Paris is a department of the Paris Regional Conservatory. It has been mixed since 1992 and recruits children from the age of eight. The pupils receive a complete musical training: polyphony, music theory, vocal technique, instrumental practice. The Maîtrise regularly performs in France and abroad with prestigious conductors and orchestras: Marcel Landowski, Pierre Boulez and the Ensemble Intercontemporain, Marek Janowski, Eliahu Inbal, Michel Corboz, Richard Hickox, Seiji Ozawa, the Orchester de Paris , the Ile-de-France National Orchestra, the Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra, the Capitole Orchestra of Toulouse, The London Symphony Orchestra, the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris. The repertoire approached by the Maîtrise is rich in diversity: creation of the jazz opera “Journal of a user of space II” by Didier Lockwood (Bastille Opera), “The dream of a summer night” by Mendelssohn (Theater Mogador – Dir: M.Minkowski), “L’enfance du Christ” by Berlioz (Ensemble Orchestral de Paris -Dir: John Nelson), “Les scenes de Faust” by Schumann (Orchester de Paris – Dir: C. Eschenbach – Salle Pleyel), “Shadows of time” by Henri Dutilleux (Dir: Michel Plasson- Salle Pleyel) in the presence of the composer, “Carmen” by Bizet (Dir: Marc Minkowski -Châtelet), creation of the operetta “Le Verfügbar aux enfers” by G.Tillion (Châtelet),“ La Damnation de Faust ”by Berlioz (Boston Symphony Orchestra and Tanglewood choir – Dir: James Levine -Salle Pleyel),“Three little liturgies of the divine presence” by Messiaen with (Ensemble Orchestral de Paris – Dir: John Nelson), “3rd Symphony” by Mahler (Budapest Orchestra -Salle Pleyel), “The Magic Flute” by Mozart (roles of the 3 geniuses – Monte Carlo Opera). In 2009, three teams of 7 child soloists created the musical show “Le voyage de Pinocchio”, directed by Sandrine Anglade. This show was the subject of a memorable tour of 37 concerts throughout France. The season ends with two concerts given at the Colmar International Music Festival, and for Opus 29 at the Festival d’Auvers-Sur-Oise, under the direction of Patrick Marco. In 2009/2010 La Maîtrise de Paris sings Britten’s War Requiem (Dir: Ingo Metzmacher (Orchester de Paris), “Perséphone” by Stravinsky (Cité de la Musique- Accentus), Stabat Mater by Haydn (Folies Françoises – dir: P. Cohen-Akenine) She was honored to be invited back for the thirtieth anniversary of the Festival d’Auvers-Sur-Oise in June 2010. She then sang Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle under the direction of Patrick Marco and received the honors of the critics of the musical world. The Maîtrise de Paris received the choir song prize Liliane Bettencourt awarded by the Academy of Fine Arts as well as the Coup de Coeur from the Charles Cros Academy for the first volume of “Songs de France “published by Editions Gallimard-Jeunesse in 2001. It is subsidized by the City of Paris and the DRAC Ile-de-France. It is also supported by the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation and the Safran Foundation for Music. of the Maîtrise de Paris has been provided by Patrick Marco since its creation.