Laurent Petitgirard

Laurent Petitgirard was born in Paris on 10 June 1950. He studied piano with his father Serge Petitgirard, a pupil of Alfred Cortot and Yves Nat, and composition with his older brother Alain Kremski (Kremski being their mother’s name).

He has composed over twenty works of symphonic music, operas, ballets, chamber music and nearly one hundred and forty scores for film and television, in a style that is “always refined, dramatic and precisely tailored to the images”. He notably wrote the music for several films by Francis Girod and the 1991 Maigret television series. He also composes lyrical works. His first opera, Joseph Merrick dit Elephant man, with a libretto by Éric Nonn, premiered in 2002 at the Prague State Opera, under the direction of Daniel Mesguich. A new production of this opera was presented in 2005 at the Minneapolis Opera, directed by Doug Varone. His second opera, Guru (commissioned by the State), based on a libretto by Xavier Maurel, explores the subject of mental manipulation. It was recorded in Budapest for the Naxos label in October 2010 under the composer’s direction and premiered on 28 September 2018 at the Castle Opera in Szczecin (Poland) in a staging by Damien Cruden, with Laurent Petitgirard conducting, and starring Hubert Claessens, Paul Gaugler and Sonia Petrovna. A new production of Guru was presented under the composer’s direction from 24 to 28 February 2024 at the Opéra de Nice, staged by Muriel Mayette-Holtz. Recordings of his three concertos, performed by Augustin Dumay, Gérard Caussé and Gary Hoffman, of his six symphonic poems and of the complete version of Maurice Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé, with the orchestra and chorus of the Opéra national de Bordeaux, are available on the Naxos label. The music he composed for Sonia Petrovna’s production of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince was recorded for the Naxos label in August 2013. His latest work is a ballet based on Si Yeou Ki (“Journey to the West”) for Chinese choreographer Whang Yabin (Naxos CD released in April 2023). This work, performed by the Wang Yabin Company, premiered on 29 April 2024 in Beijing and has since been presented all over China (it was performed in France in December 2018). His concerto for oboe and orchestra Souen Wou K’ong was first performed in Edinburgh and Glasgow in March 2022 with François Leleux and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. His trio “La Croisée des Arts” will premier in Madrid in October 2024, played by the Trio Wanderer. ...

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