Martin MATALON, guest composer

Born in Buenos Aires in 1958, studied at the Juilliard School of Music in New York where he obtained a Masters in composition. from 1989 to 1996, he founded and is musical director of the Music Mobile ensemble based in New York and dedicated to contemporary repertoire.

In 2005 he received an award from the J.S Guggenheim Foundation in New York and the award from the l'Institut de France Académie des Beaux-Arts. In 2001, he received the award from the city of Barcelona for the Music of Metropolis and the Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. In 1989 the "Opera Autrement" award from the Center Acanthes for the production of the chamber opera El Milagro secreto based on the homonymous story by J.L Borges.

In 1993, he settled permanently in Paris, the IRCAM commissioned him to write the music for the newly restored version of Metropolis by Fritz Lang. After this considerable work, Martin Matalon immerses himself in the universe of Luis Buñuel and consecutively writes 3 new scores for the three surrealist films by the Aragonese filmmaker that he made between 1927 and 1932.

His catalog includes a large number of chamber and orchestral works.

Started in 1997, the Trames series, works at the limit of solo writing for concert and chamber music, and the Traces series for solo instruments with electronic transformation in real time, constitute for the composer a kind of "intimate diary" and form an important part of its catalog.

At the same time, Martin Matalon develops an activity as an orchestra conductor. He has conducted, the Modern Ensemble, MusikFabrik, the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchester d’ Auvergne, Barcelona 216, the Intercontemporain Ensemble…
Martin Matalon has written, among others, for the Paris Orchestra, the France National Orchestra, the Lorraine National Orchestra, the Barcelona Orchestra and Catalonia, the Ensemble Intercontemporain, Musik, Ensemble Modern…
He was Composer in residence with the Metz Arsenal and the Lorraine National Orchestra (2003-4), At the center of Création and Recherche La Muse en circuit (2005-2010), Stavanger Festival (2011), in the city of Aubervilliers (2012) and in 2014 composer in residence at the Les Arcs festival.

His Opera La Sombra de Venceslao, with a libretto and staging by Jorge Lavelli to a text by Copi, premiered at the Rennes Opera in October 2016 and will be presented at 11 Opera houses in France and South America. La Sombra de Wenceslao was nominated at Les Victoires de la Musique 2017.

Yann ROBIN, guest composer

French composer. Began his musical studies in Aix-en-Provence. He then entered the jazz class of the CNR in Marseille and at the same time joined the composition class of Georges Bœuf. At the National Conservatory of Music and Dance in Paris, he obtained his composition prizes in the class of Frédéric Durieux and analysis in that of Michaël Levinas. He became a scholarship holder of the Meyer Foundation, received a prize from the Académie des Beaux-Arts as well as from the Salabert Foundation; in 2011 the Sacem awarded him the Grand Prize for Symphonic Music. From 2006 to 2008 he followed the two years of IT courses at Ircam.

It was from 2004 that he undertook a long collaboration with Alain Billard, clarinetist and soloist of the Ensemble intercontemporain for which he wrote his Art of Metal cycle composed of three pieces around the metal contrabass clarinet. From this collaboration was born in the fall of 2012 a monographic disc Vulcano / Art of Metal which was released under the Label Kairos in the Sirènes collection with Ircam and the Ensemble intercontemporain under the direction of Susanna Mälkki; this disc successively obtained a Diapason d’Or, the “Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik” as well as a Coup de Coeur from the Charles Cros Academy.

His music is performed both in France and abroad in venues such as the Muziekgebouw (Amsterdam), the KKL (Lucerne), the Lincoln Center or the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), the Konzerthaus (Vienna), The Casa da Musica (Oporto), the Wigmore Hall (London) as well as in festivals such as Manifeste, Donaueschingen, Musica, Biennale de Venise, Présences, Gaudeamus, Lucern Festival, Darmstadt... He collaborates with many ensembles and orchestras such as the Intercontemporary ensemble, the Vienna Klangforum or the Orchester Philharmonique de Radio France, the Seattle Symphony, the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, the SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg... He works with conductors like Susanna Mälkki, Alan Gilbert, François- Xavier Roth, Laurence Equilbey, Pierre-André Valade, Peter Rundel, Daniel Kawka, Alejo Pérez, Jean Deroyer…

Beyond pieces intended for chamber music, in particular the writing of a second string quartet for the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence in 2011, he received a co-commission from Ircam and the Orchester Philharmonique de Radio France for a piece for large orchestra and electronics, Inferno based on the cartography of Dante's Inferno which was premiered at the Festival Manifeste in 2012. For that same year he also received another co-commission, this time here from the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and the Casa Da Musica in Porto. In 2013 it was for the SWR Sinfonieorchesters Baden-Baden und Freiburg that he wrote Monumenta, a piece for large orchestra which was given as part of the Festival Musica in Strasbourg. In 2014 he will continue his work with the orchestra for a new piece co-commissioned by the Seattle Symphony and the Orchester National de Lille with which he will be in residence from 2014 to 2016.

Teaching, or transmission are also part of his activity; he is frequently invited to give lectures but he is also asked to teach composition in the context of composition courses or master classes. For the 2015-2016 season he will be a visiting professor at the Studio National d'Arts Contemporains, le Fresnoy.

From 2008 to 2009, he took part, as a research composer at Ircam, in ongoing work on the Omax program alongside Gérard Assayag and Arshia Cont.

In 2005, he founded the Multilateral Ensemble with other composers and became its artistic director.

From 2009 to 2010, he was a resident of the Académie de France in Rome, Villa Médicis, where he initiated a new contemporary music festival, the Controtempo Festival, of which he still ensures the programming.

His music is published by Éditions Jobert.

BARCELONA MODERN ENSEMBLE, resident ensemble

Founded in 2004 and completely renewed since in 2013 the composer Demian Luna assumes his artistic direction.

The task of these last years is based mainly on contemporary music, current and newly created, and on the interpretation and subsequent dissemination of the young emerging values ​​of contemporary Spanish and world music, as well as the already established composers: Pierre Boulez, Helmut Lachenmann, Martin Matalon, Hèctor Parra, Raphaël Cendo, Kaija Saariaho, José Manuel López López, Jonathan Harvey, Benet Casablancas, Philippe Hurel, Alberto Posadas, Ramón Lazkano, Cristóbal Halfter, Gabriel Erkoreka, Luis De Pablo, etc.

Since 2014 is the resident ensemble of the Barcelona Modern International Composition Course, working on the work of guest composers Martin Matalon (2014/15), Héctor Parra (2015/16), Raphaël Cendo (2016/17), José Manuel López López (2017/18), Philippe Hurel (2018/19), Alberto Posadas (2019/20), Francesco Filidei / Oscar Bianchi (2020/21) and premiered 15 works by young composers every year, among them: Diego Jiménez Tamame, Frédéric Le Bel, Ariadna Alsina, Jeremías Iturra, Demian Rudel Rey, Pablo Andoni Gómez Olabarría, etc.

The ensemble has performed in prestigious halls and festivals, among which stand out: the Sampler Sèries cycle at the Barcelona Auditorium, the Tarragona Spring Festival, the Josep Carreras Auditorium in Vila-seca, the Palau Robert in Barcelona, ​​the 400 MNCARS Auditorium in Madrid, the Auditorium of CatalunyaCaixa in La Pedrera, Sala Mompou (SGAE / Barcelona), Spanien Modern Festival 2009 and 2011 in Vienna, Arnold Schönberg Center, Institute of North American Studies in Barcelona, ​​Joan Miró Foundation in Barcelona, ​​Instituto Cervantes in Bremen, Aujord'hui Musiques Festival of Perpignan, National Theater of Catalonia, Museum of the University of Navarra, Institut Français-Barcelona, ​​Phonos Foundation, Mostra Sonora de Sueca, ME_MMIX Festival of Mallorca, Festival Turbulences Sonores de Montpellier, etc.

Formed by elite players specialized in contemporary repertoire, the ensemble evolves and advances at a steady pace, being already a reference of the country's current music.