LEMAITRE Dominique

From his Arts, musicology, electroacoustics and musical creation studies, Dominique Lemaître has succeeded in achieving a synthesis and has composed for a large variety of ensembles: his instrumental solos, his string quartets, his pieces for ensembles or orchestras, his collaborations with fine arts artists and poets all attest to the variety of his work. As early as his first works in which one can still feel the influence of his admiration for Bach, Debussy, Varèse, Ligeti, Scelsi, Feldman, Ohana and Henri Dutilleux from whom he received the encouragements, he has managed to create a sound world which is reflective of him : a stellar and transparent music, a metaphor-music of forces sometimes telluric or diaphanous. To the sweetness of the subtle intemporal holding of magnificently elaborated tones, this music combines an internal violence, both contained and poignant. His subtle and demanding compositions are completely assumed and lead the performer to fertile lands of expression.
His works are played in about thirty countries (among which Germany, China, The USA, GB, Italy, Japan, Russia and South America) and are performed by numerous talented soloists (like Armand Angster, Ancuza Aprodu, Dan Barrett, Jacques Bernaert, Alain Celo, Isabelle Chomet, Nathalie Cornevin, Jed Distler, Vladimir Dubois, Anne Gastinel, Jean Geoffroy, Marion Gomar, Gary Hoffman, Bernard Heulin, Kaoli Isshiki, Marie Kobayashi, Françoise Kubler, Ana-Maria Labin, François Le Roux, Karine Lethiec, Saskia Lethiec, Thierry Miroglio, François Moreau, Kiyoko Okada, Stanislav Orlovsky, Noëmi Schindler, Jérôme Schmitt, Isabel Soccoja, Michiyo Suzuki, Brigitte Trannoy-Petitgirard, Anne Ricquebourg, Vincent Roth, Sylvia Vadimova-Marini, François Veilhan, Linda Wetherill …) and a variety of ensembles : Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della Rai, Rouen/Normandie Orchestra, Picardie and Auvergne Orchestras, Nice Philharmonic Orchestra, Colonne and Les Siècles Orchestras, Bulgarian National Radio Symphonic Orchestra, the Ensemble Orchestral Contemporain, the Octuor de Violoncelles, the Oberlin Percussion Group, the Doelen Ensemble, the Rouen Chœur de Chambre, the Ensemble Vocal XX.21, Margand, Onyx and Stanislas string quartets, the Atelier Musical de Touraine, the trio Dumesnil-Sirois, the duo Chomet-Cazé, Accroche Note, Bach and Forth, 2E2M, Campsis, Stravinsky, Artedie, Calliopée, Mémoires sonores, Slowind, Sonata Concert, Surplus, Yin, EEMC, Akantha, the Solistes de Monte Carlo ensembles … conducted by Philippe Bender, Nicolas Brochot, Edmon Colomer, Laurent Cuniot, Marco Guidarini, Daniel Kawka, Paul Méfano, Jean-Pierre Pinet, Jérôme Polack, Pascal Rophé, François-Xavier Roth, Oswald Sallaberger, Boris Spassov, David Stern, Arie Van Beek...
The ministry of culture, Radio France, the European Union, the Rouen Opera, the Picardie Orchestra, the Auvergne Orchestra, Automne en Normandie, Fonds d’Action Sacem, Fonds de Mécénat Olvéa, Beauvais and Fécamp towns, Normandie Impressionniste, Musique Nouvelle en Liberté-Ville de Paris, Terres de paroles and various festivals and ensembles have commissioned works to Dominique Lemaître. We can recognise in his works his fondness for concertante music written for the horn (Hypérion), the cello (Altius, Horizons réflexes), the violin (Vers l’eau, vers le feu), the viola (Secrète perspective), the percussion (Resonare fibris), the saxophone (Hybris), the guitar (Khronos, hommage à Stephen Hawking)... the cello octet and orchestra (Huit à l’infini), as well as voices (Babilim, Orante, La Ghirlandata, Circé, Les ailes de l’augure, Mantras, La chevelure de Bérénice, Trois chants de l’évidence...) without forgetting the monodrame Les Moires.
One will also note a recent first performance in Fécamp with Armel Veilhan and the orchestra of the Opera of Rouen Normandie under the direction of Patrick Hahn : the work for reciter and orchestra entitled Le grand silence, commissioned for the commemorations of the centenary of the end of the First World War.
Dominique Lemaître was invited as an artist in residence in 2001-2002 by the National Conservatory of Music of Rouen and Haute Normandie Region and in 2004 by the University of Oberlin (Ohio/USA), in 2010 in Metz by the Ensemble Stravinsky, in 2012 in Tours by the Atelier Musical de Touraine and in 2012-2013 by ESADHaR (Ecole Supérieure d’Art et de Design du Havre et de Rouen).
After a first monographic CD recorded at the IRACM in 1995, his CD Litanie du soleil got a “coup de cœur” award at the Academy Charles Cros in 2002. A third monographic CD was released in 2005 including four works recorded by Noëmi Schindler, Gary Hoffman, the Ensemble Orchestral Contemporain, the Octuor de Violoncelles and the Nice Philharmonic Orchestra under the direction of Daniel Kawka. The fourth monographic CD Le diapason de satin recorded with the Arsenal of Metz by Isabel Soccoja, Alain Celo and the Ensemble Stravinsky directed by Jean-Pierre Pinet was selected for the Grand Prix Lycéen des Compositeurs 2013. The fifth monographic CD Et le soleil comme désir recorded by the Atelier Musical de Touraine was released in 2013. The CD Pulsars devoted mainly to his music for flute interpreted by François Veilhan and the Ensemble Campsis was released in 2015. The eighth monographic CD String Quartets recorded in Nancy by the Stanislas Quartet and the soprano Kaoli Isshiki was awarded in 2019 by the Rouen Academy of Sciences, Fine Letters and Arts. In 2020 the New Yorker cellist Dan Barrett publishes on New Focus Recordings De l’espace trouver la fin et le milieu, a CD devoted to his solos and duets for/with cello.
Moreover the musicologist Pierre Albert Castanet published in 2005 (Cig’Art edition) L’instant et l’éternité, Entretiens avec Dominique Lemaître and the book entitled 51 partitions de Dominique Lemaître from the poet Alexis Pelletier was published in 2009 by Tarabuste and the book-CD entitled Du silence et de quelques spectres from Alexis Pelletier including the recording of seven compositions of Dominique Lemaître was released in 2014 with the Editions Clarisse. Pierre Albert Castanet’s book A la recherche du temps suspendu, à propos de la musique de Dominique Lemaître au XXIème siècle was released in March 2018 with the Editions Aedam musicae.

Dominique Lemaître’s works are published by Editions Musicales Rubin, Jobert, Lemoine and Universal Music Publishing Classical (Durand-Salabert-Eschig).