This weeklong bi-lingual summer course, held in a 12th-century manor in France’s lush Loire valley, provides the opportunity to study French music with world-renowned performers while exploring the cultural jewels of the region. Guest artists Jean-Pierre Collot, Irina Kataeva, Thomas LaCôte, Marilyn Nonken, and Alain Planes will perform, lecture, and work daily with students. You’ll practice, learn, and perform in this magical environment, while enjoying outings to historic sites, elegant accommodations, and traditional cuisine.

PROPOSED SCHEDULE

18 June

Students arrivals throughout the day. Lunch will be provided.

5pm Welcome and Orientation
6pm Concert : Marilyn Nonken and Irina Kataeva, duo piano
Scriabin Promethee, Debussy La Mer
7:30 pm Dinner

19 June

9h30-12h30 Master Class : Jean-Pierre Collot
1-2 pm Lunch
3:30-5pm Personal time
5:30 pm Visit to Château d’Azay le Ferron
7:30 pm Dinner

20 June

9:30-12:30 Master Class : Jean-Pierre Collot
1 pm Lunch
3-4:30 Lecture or Personal time
4:30 Visit to l’Eglise Paulnay
6 pm Concert : Jean-Pierre Collot
7:30 Dinner

21 June

9:30-12:30 Master Class : Marilyn Nonken
1pm Lunch
2-4 pm Lecture : Thomas LaCôte
5 pm Concert : Marilyn Nonken (Music of Tristan Murail)
6 pm Student Concert
7:30 Dinner

22 June

10-13 Master class : Alain Planes
1pm Lunch
2 pm Visit to Monastery St. Savin
6 pm Concert : Alain Planes (Music of Debussy)
7:30 Dinner

23 June

10-13 Master Class : Alain Planès
1 pm Lunch
2 :30pm Visit to Chateau d’Amboise (Grave of Leonardo Da Vinci)
7:30 Dinner

24 June

10-13 Master class : Alain Planès
1 pm Lunch
2 pm Visit to Eglise Nohan les Fontaines (paintings of Jean Fouquet, XIV century)
6 pm Student Concert
7:30 Dinner
25 June
Departure after breakfast

FACULTY

JEAN-PIERRE COLLOT

Pianist Jean-Pierre Collot studied under Jean-Claude Pennetier, Christian Ivaldi and Jean Koerner at the University of Paris (CNSM), and completed his studies with three First Prizes with distinctions for piano, chamber music and collaborative piano. A member of the Ensemble Intercontemporain (1993-1999) and ensemble recherche (2003-2017), he has collaborated closely with composers such as Helmut Lachenmann, Salvatore Sciarrino, Hugues Dufourt, and Brice Pauset. 2016 saw the release of his solo CD Universe, featuring music of Debussy and Sciarrino, « an album with overwhelming virtuosity and sound magic » (Reinhard Brembeck, Sueddeutsche Zeitung). Other recordings include Espaces Imaginaires (music of Jean Barraqué) and Spectral Visions of Goethe (works by Dufourt and transcriptions of Schubert by Liszt and Czerny), and a
book devoted to the great Soviet pianist Maria Youdina: Maria Yudina – Pierre Souvtchinsky : Correspondance et documents (1959-1970). His latest album, Marche fatale (2022) features Beethoven’s « Pastoral Symphony » transcribed by Liszt, framed by works of Lachenmann. Collot has given master classes, workshops and presentations on contemporary music in Russia, Uzbekistan, Georgia, Ukraine, Israel, China, South America, and the United States. Since 2006, he has lived in Munich.

IRINA KATAEVA

A French pianist of Russian origin, Irina Kataeva is known for her interpretations of 20th-century music. Settled in France since 1985, she has performed extensively in France (IRCAM, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Radio-France, Centre Acanthes) and at festivals around the world, with composers including Olivier Messian, Pierre Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen and György Ligeti; at Ligeti’s request, she recorded several of his works for Sony Classics, including his Etude pour Irina.
She presented the Russian premiere of Messiaen’s song cycle Harawi, which she performed and recorded for Melodia with singer Natalia Rozanova and, in the 1980s, worked to bring the music of Dmitri Shostakovich to France, where it was rarely performed. An active teacher and adjudicator, Kataeva has taught at the Conservatoire à Rayonnement Départemental d’Evry; given master-classes in Italy, Germany, Finland, England, Spain, China, Russia, Nepal and the USA; and chaired the jury of the International Contemporary Music Competition for Youth in Fribourg, Switzerland, four times. From 2009 to 2019, as part an advanced training program for young singers, she directed master classes in French vocal chamber music at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow. In 2012, she created the Rencontres musicales de Jaugette, the only festival of art music in the Indre region, of which she is Artistic Director.

THOMAS LACÔTE

Performer, composer, and musicologist Thomas Lacôte enjoys prominent stature within the young generation of French artists. Appointed at age 20 as organist of the cathedral of Bourges, in 2011 he became assistant titulaire of the main organ at Eglise St-Trinité in Paris, a position occupied by Olivier Messiaen for more than 60 years. His many musical activities – composition, performance, improvisation, teaching and also musicological research – have made of him an all-round musician bringing together practise, research and creation. Trained at the Conservatories of Poitiers and Saint Maur des Fossés, and eventually at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse in Paris, he was assistant to composer-pianist Michaël Levinas before assuming the directorship of studies in 20th- and 21st-Century music. He is active as a composer, organist, and scholar ; with musicologists Yves Balmer and Charles Murray, he has conducted extensive research on the work of Messiaen for several years, leading to the publication Le modèle et l’invention : Olivier Messiaen et la technique de l’emprunt (2017), awarded the special jury prize by France Musique des Muses, and international publications in 20th Century Music and the Journal of the American Musicological Society. Presently, Lacôte teaches analysis and theory at the Paris Conservatoire.

MARILYN NONKEN

Marilyn Nonken studied with David Burge at the Eastman School of Music ; after working after graduation with Leonard Stein, assistant to Arnold Schönberg, she received a Ph.D. in musicology from Columbia University. Since then, she has been heralded as « a determined protector of important music » (New York Times) and presented at major concert venues around the world as a soloist, duo pianist, and chamber musician. She has made more than 30 recordings, and her concert repertoire and discography notably feature composers associated with spectral music (Hugues Dufourt, Joshua Fineberg, Tristan Murail, Michael Levinas, Christopher Trapani, Claude Vivier) and the American experimental tradition (Morton Feldman, Alvin Lucier) ; additionally, 2024 saw the release Hugues Dufourt: L’Origine du monde (Divine Art) and Morton Feldman: Complete Music for Cello and Piano (with Stephen Marotto, Mode). Her writings on music include The Spectral Piano (Cambridge, 2015) and Identity and Diversity in New Music: The New Complexities (Routledge, 2019), as well as chapters for Perspectives on the Performance of French Piano Music, Messiaen Perspectives, Messiaen in Context, and The Oxford Handbook of Spectral Music. Marilyn Nonken is Professor of Music and Music Education at New York University.

ALAIN PLANÈS

Pianist Alain Planès is acclaimed for his interpretations of Debussy, Satie, and Satie, although his vast repertoire includes Schubert and Haydn – composers he has devoted much time to in the concert hall and recording studio – as well as music of Boulez, Berio, Ligeti, and Stockhausen. He studied first at the Paris Conservatory with Jacques Février, and continued his studies in the United States at the Univeristy of Indiana at Bloomington; there, his most important teachers were Menahem Pressler, Franco Gulli, William Primrose, and György Sebök, and he performed regularly in chamber concerts with the cellist Janos Starker. Upon returning to France, Planès performed with the Ensemble Intercontemporain before launching a busy career as a solo and collaborative pianist. He has sinced appeared with leading orchestras and at many festivals, including Marlboro, Aix-en-Provence, and Montreux and recorded extensively for the Harmonia Mundi label, most recently a disc featuring the music of Gabriel Fauré (2024). His other recordings include Debussy’s Children’s Corner Suite (2006), Chopin chez Pleyel (2009), as well as Liszt’s transcriptions of Beethoven’s symphonies (2020) and Chopin’s complete nocturnes (2021).

Contact

Irina Kataeva (FR)
jaugette@gmail.com
+33 6 2040 0130
Marilyn Nonken (US)
marilyn.nonken@nyu.edu
(347) 804-9684

https://www.facebook.com/Jaugette