With a deep belief in the power of collaborative music making, Guillaume Pirard has become a highly respected artist and educator of his generation.
As co-concertmaster and founding member of The Knights, Mr. Pirard toured extensively throughout the United States and Europe with performances at the Tonhalle in Zurich, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and the Muziverein in Vienna, and major festival appearances at Tanglewood, Ravinia, Caramoor, Skaneateles, the Festival-de-Paques in Aix-en-Provence and the Salzburg Festpiele. He has recorded with the ensemble on SONY Classical and Warner Music. He has also performed with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, A Far Cry, the Sejong Soloists, the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, and with renowned musicians such as Yo-Yo Ma, Dawn Upshaw, Vijay Iyer, Andy Akiho, and Reinbert De Leeuw to name a few.
Following his interest in performance practices, Guillaume studied in Den Haag and Brussels with some of the masters of the romantic, classical and baroque styles such as Vera Beths, Mira Glodeanu and Anner Bylsma. He has played in various period ensembles and chamber music series in Europe and the United-States, such as the Helicon Foundation, the Smithsonian Chamber Players, the Chamber Music Society of Central Virginia, the Staunton Festival, Les Muffatti and the Context series at Rice University.
As a conductor, Mr.Pirard has led the New York University and Cornell University Orchestras, the Orlando Philharmonic, Ensemble X, OpusIthaca, the Philharmonic of Moravia, the Metamorphosis Chamber Orchestra, the Lviv Philharmonic, the Mannes School of Music Opera and the Mannes Orchestra. He served as Assistant Conductor for the Buffalo Philharmonic and Ensemble 21. His pursuit of conducting owes a great debt to the encouragement of his mentors, Larry Rachleff and JoAnn Falletta.
Born in Belgium, Mr. Pirard studied at the Brussels Royal Conservatory of Music, receiving a First Prize in violin performance at the age of 16. He continued his studies at the Juilliard School with Hyo Kang and Dorothy Delay. He earned a Masters Degree in Orchestral Conducting from the New School, under the tutelage of David Hayes. Mr. Pirard has served previously on the faculty at New York University, San Diego State University, and Cornell University.
For up-to-date information on the Music, Theater & Dance program at Ithaca College, click here! For more information about me, please visit guillaumepirard.com or my YouTube channel here.