’An enthusiastic musician with a multi-faceted personality, Henri Demarquette plays the cello as if setting a deep forest ablaze; not a single stroke of his bow leaves the listener indifferent, because he awakens music’s subconscious.’
Le Monde de la Musique
Born in 1970, Henri Demarquette, was thirteen when he entered the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Paris, where he studied with Philippe Muller and Maurice Gendron. He was unanimously awarded a Premier Prix, and went on to work with Pierre Fournier and Paul Tortelier before taking lessons from János Starker in Bloomington, Indiana.
He appeared on the stage from the age of fourteen, and made his concert debut at seventeen with a recital at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris and a recording for France 3 Television with the pianist Hélène Grimaud. He came to the attention of Lord Yehudi Menuhin, who invited him to play the Dvorák Concerto under his direction in Prague and Paris.
His career has been of international dimensions ever since, taking him to many capitals in the company of the foremost French and international orchestras, most recently the Orchestre National de France, the London Philharmonic, the Vienna Chamber Orchestra, the Ensemble orchestral de Paris, the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre National de Bordeaux- Aquitaine, Sinfonia Varsovia, and the Neue Philharmonie Westphalen. He also appears regularly with his favourite piano partners Brigitte Engerer, Michel Dalberto, Giovanni Bellucci, and Boris Berezovsky.
Curious by nature, Henri Demarquette frequently performs contemporary music and has a penchant for rare pieces. He works closely with the leading contemporary composers, and has inspired compositions by Olivier Greif (Concerto ‘Durch Adams Fall’), Pascal Zavaro (Concerto), Eric Tanguy (Nocturne), Florentine Mulsant (Sonata), and Alexandre Gasparov (Nocturne). His performance of Henri Dutilleux’s Concerto Tout un monde lointain . . . with the Akademisches Orchester Mannheim under Frédéric Chaslin was the subject of a film produced by France Europe Média with the support of the Fonds d’Action SACEM.
His open-minded approach to music is reflected in his eclectic discography. Many of his recordings have received awards in France and abroad, including the following:
• ‘Par la Chute d’Adam’: Concerto and Sonata by Olivier Greif (1950-2000) with the Orchestre National de France conducted by Jean-Claude Casadesus and Giovanni Bellucci, piano
• The three Brahms cello sonatas with Michel Dalberto
• ‘L’Invitation au voyage’: works by Fauré, Debussy and Ravel, with Brigitte Engerer
• The complete Beethoven cello sonatas with Michel Dalberto
• The complete cello works of Chopin with Brigitte Engerer
• Bach’s six solo cello suites
• The two Haydn concertos with the Orchestre de Chambre de Toulouse
• Légende by Jean Cras with the Luxembourg Philharmonic
• The complete works for cello and piano of James MacMillan with the pianist Graham Scott
He has also been awarded the Prix de la Fondation Simone et Cino del Duca by the Académie des Beaux Arts.
Henri Demarquette plays a cello of 1697 by the Italian luthier Gioffredo Cappa with a Persois bow dated 1820.
