The acclaim
accorded to the pianist Nicolas Bringuier by audiences and critic alike
confirms his status as one of France's most exciting artist of his generation.
In the last few seasons, he has played in such major concert halls across
Europe and Asia, like the Wiener Musikverein, the Berlin Philharmonie, the
Auditorio of Madrid and the Seoul Arts Center.
Born in Nice in
1980, Nicolas Bringuier entered at the age of 13 the Conservatoire National
Superieur de Musique in Paris in the class of Bruno Rigutto and already at the
age of 16, he was awarded the First Price of Piano. After 2 years of
post-graduate studies in Paris, he joined the class of Klaus Hellwig at the
University of the Arts in Berlin, where he graduated in 2009 with the highest
distinctions. He has also completed his musical formation by attending
master-classes with D. Bashkirov, O. Maisenberg, D. Merlet, J-C. Pennetier,
J.Perry,V. Viardo...
After his
successes in renowned international music contests, most notably the 2nd Prize
of the Robert Schumann Competition in Zwickau , Nicolas Bringuier has performed
numerous concerts across Europe and has played as a soloist in major concert
halls such as the Salle Gaveau in Paris, the Konzerthaus in Berlin, the Palais
Garnier in Monte-Carlo, the Philharmonic Hall in Warsaw, the Halle aux Grains
in Toulouse...
He has been
invited in prestigious festivals such as the Festival Radio-France in
Montpellier, the Printemps des Arts in Monte-Carlo, the Colmar festival, the
European Classic Festival Ruhr, the Chopin Nights in Nohant, the Schwetzingen
and the Mosel Festwochen, the Szeged Chamber Mucic Festival, the
Schiermonnikoog Chamber music Festival, the Piano Nights in Chisinau...
Nicolas
Bringuier has performed as a soloist with orchestras such as the Orchestre
Philharmonique du Capitole de Toulouse, the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra, the
Berliner Symphoniker, the Zwickau-Plauen Philharmonic, the Nice Philharmonic,
the Orchestre Lyrique d'Avignon, the Orchestre Régional de Cannes, the Orquesta
Sinfonica de Castilla y Leon, the Baleares Philharmonic, the Wuhan
Philharmonic, the International Players of Busan, with conductors such as
Philippe Bender, Yoav Talmi, Philippe Bernold, Fréderic Lodéon, James Liu, Yoel
Gamzou, Nanse Gum and on a regular basis under the baton of his brother Lionel
Bringuier.
Passionated of
chamber music, he has formed since 2003 a piano duo with the ukrainian pianist
Olga Monakh, the Duo Siloti. In 2017
they made a highly succesfull tour in China and were immediately reinvited for
2019.
Together they
are artistic directors of Les Rencontres Musicales du Negresco, a chamber music
festival held each year in Nice, as well as of the Samson Francois
International Competition in Cagnes-sur-Mer.
Furthermore he
has been playing with such artists as Andrej Bielow, Nicolas Dautricourt, Gary
Hoffman, Esther Hoppe, Raphael Oleg, Regis Pasquier, Jeroen Reuling, Francois
Salque, Diana Tishchenko, István Várdai,
Alexander Zemtsov and the Prazak Quartet.
His recordings
for Audite has obtained a great international press acclaim, the Schumann
album was named one of the Recording of
the year by the Fanfare magazine in America, and by the Bavarian Radio in
Germany. His Bartók recital has been also unanimously praised by the critics.
Nicolas Bringuier teached at the University of Arts in Berlin in 2016/2017. From 2017 to 2020 he was a Professor for piano at the faculty of the Inje University in Busan, South Korea. He is now based in Nice, where he is holding on a regular basis masterclasses for advanced students. He is a regular jury member in national and international competitions.
German pianist of Ukrainian origin, Olga Monakh has established herself in recent years as an artist with phenomenal charisma, equally at home in solo repertoire as well as in lied and chamber music.
Celebrated by critics as a pianist “endowed with a strong artistic personality and a rich imagination”, she gained the attention of the musical world by becoming laureate of several International Competitions, notably the Vianna da Motta and Porto Competitions in Portugal, Artur Schnabel in Berlin, Vlado Perlemuter in France, where she also won the Audience Award unanimously.
Recognized pedagogue, teaching in particular at the PianoInsel Academy which she founded with Nicolas Bringuier, as well as at the Rubinstein Academy, her students have already won numerous awards.
Olga Monakh completed brilliant musical studies in her hometown of Kharkov, at the Special Music School for Child Prodigies. At the age of 10, she gave her first recital and won several national competitions.
In 2001 she joined the prestigious class of Klaus Hellwig at the Berlin University of the Arts, where she obtained her Soloist Diploma with the highest distinctions, then joined the famous Konzertexamen class.
During masterclasses, she regularly worked with Dominique Merlet, Elisso Virssaladze and Kristina Steinegger.
Laureate of the Hindemith foundations, Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now, Ottilie Selbach in Germany, supported by the Musical Academy of Villecroze, Olga Monakh had also from an early age some remarkable success in international competitions:
2nd Prize of the Schnabel Competition in Berlin in 2002, laureate of the Porto competition in 2003, she won in 2004 the Third Prize at the Vianna da Motta competition in Lisbon, the First Prize not being awarded.
At the Vlado Perlemuter competition in Caen in 2009, she won the 2nd prize as well as the Audience Prize, bestowed on her unanimously by the hundreds of people in the audience!
Olga Monakh has performed with the Gulbenkian Orchestra of Lisbon under the direction of Oleg Soldatov, the Sinfonia Varsovia under that of Peter Csaba, the Wiener-Concertverein and Yoel Gamzou as well as with the Kharkov and Wernigerode Philharmonic Orchestras.
She is a regular guest of concert series in France, Switzerland, Germany, Italy and has been playing in festivals such as Mosel Festwochen, Rheingau Musik Festival, Weseler Klaviersommer and Europäisches Klassik Festival Ruhr in Germany, Kyoto International Music Festival in Japan, Il concerto in Trieste in Italy, Ciclo Premiar a Exelencia in Oeiros and at the Teatro Sao Luis in Lisbon.
She has been heard in prestigious venues such as the Philharmonie and Konzerthaus in Berlin, the Musikverein in Vienna, the Tonhalle in Düsseldorf, the Teatro Sao Luiz in Lisbon.
Her repertoire is remarkably extensive in the fields of recital, chamber music and lied.
Regular partner of baritone Peter Schoene, together they ensure the world premiere of a cycle of Lieder by Wolfgang Rihm, composed for them. A live recording of this concert has been released on a CD. They are currently working on the complete recording of Schubert’s Lieder.
Together with the pianist Nicolas Bringuier, they have been playing for twenty years as a piano duo and gave numerous concerts across Europe and Asia. In 2021, when they moved to Nice, the duo took the name Duo Siloti.
Since 2012 Olga and Nicolas have been artistic directors of the "Rencontres musicales du Negresco" in Nice, an annual chamber music festival. Their partners are the violinists Andrej Bielow, Nicolas Dautricourt, Amanda Favier, Esther Hoppe, Vera Novakova, Raphael Oleg, the violists Altin Tafilaj, Alexander Zemtsov, the cellists Frédéric Audibert, Gary Hoffman, François Salque, Istvan Várdai, Ukjin Yang as well as clarinetist Dennitsa Laffchieva.
She also performed with the Ysaye and Volta quartets.
Between 2013 and 2015 Olga Monakh taught at the University of the Arts in Berlin and then founded the “PianoInsel” Academy with Nicolas Bringuier in this same city.
Her students won many prizes, including the First Prize at the National Youth Musical Competition “Jugend musiziert”. Her students also distinguished themselves in international competitions, which led her to be invited to serve as a jury member of several of them.
In 2019 she was appointed Professor at the Rubinstein Academy in Berlin.
