Jérémie Rhorer was named ‘Discovery of the Year 2008’ by the French critics. Wherever he performs, he is praised for his theatrical sensibility, his subtle musicality, and his excellent technique.
Born in Paris in 1973, Rhorer studied the harpsichord, theory and composition at the Conservatoire National Supérieur in Paris. He assisted Marc Minkowski and William Christie at a young age. At 21, he formed the contemporary music ensemble Les Musiciens de la Prée. In 2005, together with violinist Julien Chauvin, he founded Le Cercle de l’Harmonie, an orchestra which performs on period instruments and focuses on the music of the late 18th century. In 2006, Jérémie Rhorer and Le Cercle de l’Harmonie caught the attention of a wider public as they electrified audiences with their performances of Idomeneo at the Festival International d’Opéra Baroque in Beaune, where they have since returned every season. Debuts followed in 2007 at the Theatre des Champs-Elysees with Le nozze di Figaro and 2008 with Haydn’s L’infedeltà delusa at the Festival d’Aix en Provence.
2011 was Rhorer’s first season as Artistic Director of the Theatre de Champs-Elysee’s annual Mozart festival, where he conducts Le Cercle in staged performances of Idomeneo (2011), Cosi fan tutte (2012) and Don Giovanni (2013). They also appear together every year at the Musikfest Bremen, have a residency in Deauville, and maintain ongoing relationships with the Festival d’Aix and the Opera Comique for French and Viennese operas. In June 2011 they made their London debut at the Barbican Centre: “...a mightily impressive UK debut under the subtle, alert hand of conductor Jeremie Rhorer” (Daily Telegraph).
Rhorer made his Wiener Staatsoper debut in January 2011 with Cosi fan tutte and was immediately invited for Le nozze di Figaro in 2012. In 2009 he conducted Le nozze di Figaro at La Monnaie, returning for Idomeneo a year later, with concerts and further productions planned for 2013 and 2014. In 2013 he makes his Glyndebourne debut at the helm of the London Philharmonic orchestra with Figaro.
In 2010, he made his Salzburg Festival debut conducting the Mozarteum Orchestra with Diana Damrau, and in 2011 his North American debut at the Mostly Mozart Festival in New York. In 2011 he also conducted the Munich Chamber Orchestra, Orchestre National Bordeaux, Baseler Kammerorchester (Brahms, Berlioz, Kagel) and the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen at the Hamburg Brahms Festival (Brahms German Requiem with NDR Rundfunkchor). In 2012 he will debut with the Rotterdam Philharmonic and Frankfurt Radio Symphony orchestras.
Previous orchestral engagements have included the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Stuttgart RSO, Ensemble Modern (Weill Seven Deadly Sins with Angelika Kirschlager) and the orchestras of La Monnaie, Opera Bastille and Opera de Lyon.
Jérémie Rhorer is also a notable composer. He is a winner of the ‘Pierre Cardin Composition Prize’ of the Académie des Beaux-Arts and he has several commissioned works by the French Radio. His complete chamber music compositions were performed at the festival in La Roche-Posay in 2006. In November 2008, the orchestral version of his piano work Le cimetière des enfants was premiered by the Orchestre National de Paris.
Following several very successful discs for Virgin Classics/EMI with Le Cercle, Rhorer has begun a series of Beethoven recordings on Naive, with the first release (Beethoven Symphony No.1) garnering excellent reviews also: “there is currently no French period ensemble championing early Beethoven with such vibrant colours and controlled jubilation “ (Telerama, June 2011).
Jérémie Rhorer is represented by Intermusica. September 2011 / 565 words.
Not to be altered without permission. Please destroy all previous biographical material.
Le Cercle de l’Harmonie / J.C. Bach Amadis de Gaule
“This successful resurrection after more than 230 years of silence of JC Bach’s Amadis, an opera poised at the juncture between the Baroque era and the Classical era, is entirely down to Jérémie Rohrer’s ensemble, the Cercle de l’Harmonie.”
Le Monde, January 2012
Haydn’s Symphony No. 22 / Mozart Symphony No. 29 / Avery Fisher Hall / Mozart Festival Orchestra
"His account of Mozart’s Symphony No. 29 was generally pleasing as well. It took a moment to get used to his brisk opening tempo... but you had to admire the trim textures and focus he brought to the fast movements, and the Andante had an irresistible lilt."
Allan Kozinn, New York Times, August 2011
Beethoven Symphony No.1, Creatures of Prometheus, Romances etc.
Le Cercle de l’Harmonie, Julian Chauvet, Alexandra Coku (Naive)
“The Cercle de l'Harmonie yields to the thrilling rhythms without jeopardising the silky elegance of the phrasing...lightning reactions from the winds, precise bowings and lightness of touch from the strings; there is currently no French period ensemble championing early Beethoven with such vibrant colours and controlled jubilation. The nine principal players underpin the clarity and natural luminosity of the ensemble by emphasising a particular phrase or highlighting a certain colour.”
Telerama, June 2011
“Jeremie Rhorer caresses, balances, murmurs, whips up the music by turns with a nervous panache harking back to Mozart in his woodwind inflexions (especially the clarinets) – he has just the right touch, sincere and full of humanity.... He captures very well the sense that a new master of composition is emerging, that a genius has been revealed; the muscular yet finely-calibrated edginess of the Allegro molto e vivace, and the virtuosic elegance, so clear and luminous, with a kind of relaxed frenzy, in the final Allegro molto.”
Classique News, June 2011
Mozart Idomeneo / Orchestre le Cercle de l’Harmonie / Théâtre des Champs-Élysées /
Dir. Stéphane Braunschweig
“Rhorer’s ‘Idomeneo’ calls out to you, unseats you, fascinates you and convinces you... Rhorer has become one of the greatest hopes of the conducting world. He is a Mozartian through and through, and imbues his own ensemble and every orchestra he conducts with remarkable intensity, drive, sensitivity and sensuality. He is one of the most promising conductors of his generation.”
Nicole Duault, Le Journal du Dimanche, June 2011
“His deep understanding of and love for singing are obvious when he conducts. His eloquent and precise, often dance-like, conducting technique embraces the voices and allows them to flourish.”
Emmanuelle Giuliani, La Croix, June 2011
“For three hours, the Orchestre du Cercle de l’Harmonie created a rounded, warm sound, resonant with a thousand nuances… This splendid orchestral sound was the result of in-depth work on the dynamic gradations, quite the opposite of the hysterical interpretation of baroque music so in vogue these recent years.”
Eric Dahan, Libération, June 2011
“Jérémie Rhorer conducted with contagious vigour and a definite sense of Mozartian spirit.”
Marie-Aude Roux, Le Monde, June 2011
“With his confident and flexible conducting, Rhorer paid attention to the singers at all times, and underlined the tensions and emotions of this stunning opera written by Mozart at the age of 25, giving it a rare dramatic efficacy. This was the work of a master conductor.”
Philippe Venturini, Les Echos, June 2011
“The standing ovation for the musical performance was unanimous, and well-deserved… Just like the Mozart of his ‘period instrument’ colleagues John Eliot Gardiner and René Jacobs, this young French conductor’s Mozart was passionate and quicksilver... Jérémie Rhorer’s Apollonian conducting never infringed on the need for reserve and tact.”
Gilles Macassar, Télérama, June 2011
"Under the baton of Jérémie Rhorer, the young conductor rightly already famous, precision and subtlety reign in the orchestra and mingle with the voice to perfect the expressiveness.”
Claude Helleu, Alta Musica, June 2011
"The rest is all in the sound: the orchestra takes no risks, and Jérémie Rhorer clearly knows his Mozart, he loves and reveres him, with elegance but without fantasy.”
Caroline Alexander, Web Thea, June 2011
Mozart C minor Mass and Vespers / Orchestre le Cercle de l'Harmonie / Barbican
“This all-Mozart concert was their UK debut, and mightily impressive it was, too... the subtle, alert hand of conductor Jeremie Rhorer, who is clearly a musician of fine sensibility as well as a fine technique.... what really marked this performance out as something special was the way it caught the music’s grandeur and minatory force. The hallmark was clarity combined with spacious tempi, so we could feel Mozart’s grinding harmonic clashes impacting on our nerves as well as our ears. All in all a marvel.”
Ivan Hewett, Daily Telegraph, June 2011
Brahms Requiem / Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie / Laeiszhalle, Hamburg
“Following the powerful imagination of the young French conductor Jérémie Rohrer, and as one body, the ensemble built up the tremendous dynamic phrases which Brahms had stretched out between the promise of consolation and the vision of deliverance. Defined and decisive, yet always slender and forwards-driven amongst the polyphonic jostling, the choir and orchestra articulated the powerful choral fugues, especially those reminiscent of the masterly old organ fugues, promising security in God’s hands to the souls of the righteous.”
Lutz Lesle, Die Welt, April 2011
Mozart / Sacchini / Gluck
Munich Chamber Orchestra
“Das Münchener Kammerorchester erwies sich durch sein höchst lebendig phrasiertes Spiel hörbar animiert vom jungen Alte-Musik-Spezialisten Rhorer am Pult.”
“One could hear the Munich Chamber Orchestra’s animated response to Rhorer’s vivacious phrasing.“
Sueddeutsche.de, March 2011
Beethoven
Orchestre le Cercle de l'Harmonie
Palais des Beaux Arts, Brussels
“An exceptionally brilliant, transparent and full sound, emerging from the vision shared by all the musicians – strings, wind and percussion – organically connected to their conductor. Rohrer directed his little orchestra in the same way that a virtuoso violinist handles his bow: everything came together; the music radiated out from him and took on meaning – both lace and fire at the same time. After a speedy overture, perfectly imbued with life and dynamism, the orchestra demonstrated its familiarity with lyrical music … a delight both to watch and to hear, bursting out as if brand new because of the sheer daring of the performance.”
La Libre, February 2011
"Un récital raccourci, donc, mais l'on préférera la qualité à la quantité. Les 36 musiciens, sous la direction de Jérémie Rhorer, ont magnifiquement interprété trois oeuvres de jeunesse de Beethoven : l'ouverture et l'introduction du ballet Les créatures de Prométhée, la Romance pour violon et orchestre opus 50 et la Symphonie No.1."
"The 36 musicians magnificently interpreted three works of Beethoven's youth under the direction of Jeremie Rhorer"
Charlotte Murat, Ouestfrance.fr, February 2011
Così fan tutte
Wiener Staatsoper debut
“Rohrer, an early music specialist from Paris, broke with tradition and led the Viennese orchestra quite deliberately into a sound world of dynamic variety and harsh tempi, to amazing effect. The musicians of the Philharmonie followed him astonishingly willingly.”
Von Wilhelm Sinkovicz, Die Presse, January 2011
“The young French conductor’s lyrical sensuality suited the magnificent set design well, and he reached a high level of dynamic refinement.”
Von Christoph Irrgeher, Wiener Zeitung, January 2011
“The Staatsopernorchester followed the tight direction of the ambitious and flexible conductor Jérémie Rohrer closely”
Thomas Trenkler, Standard, January 2011
Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev and Dukas
Orchestre National Bordeaux Aquitaine
“He revealed all the charm of Tchaikovsky’s 1st symphony...and breathed life into even the most academic passages...nothing can resist an accomplished Mozartian!”
François Clairant, Sud Ouest, November 2010
Salzburg 1773: Symphonies 25, 26 & 29
Le Cercle de l'Harmonie/Rhorer (Virgin Classics 50999 234868)
“These performances will blow your head off…. Young French conductor Jérémie Rhorer… takes risks but not liberties. Speeds are break-neck, colours brilliant.”
The Observer, March 2009
“Jérémie Rhorer…confirmed the impression he has been making, of a rising star in the French operatic firmament.”
Mike Reynolds, www.musicalcriticism.com
“We are going to hear more of Rhorer for sure, as his experience develops and his expertise blossoms.”
www.burgandytoday.com, July 2009
“Young conductor Jérémie Rohrer proves his talent and gives a sparkling interpretation of the piece.”
Wiener Zeitung, July 2009
“The young French maestro, is a brilliant representative of the music of the Enlightenment, [and] is one of the most promising young conductors.”
www.classiquenews.com, April 2009
“Once again, the vogue this year is to bow before Jérémie Rhorer…not only the quality of performance combines elegance, technical accuracy and musicality, but the interpretation is, above all, truly classical. (…) Jérémie Rhorer gave us a real lesson of classicism. A lesson reinforced by the choice of instruments, which emphasizes intimacy and precision to create a light but ever precise scene.”
www.resmusica.com, March 2009
Mozart Symphonies Nos. 25, 26 & 29 (Salzburg 1773)
(Virgin Classics 2009)
“He [Rhorer] works with drastically dynamic extremes and contrasts light and shade very sharply, making the music seem tremendously vivid.”
“Rhorer combines the most important qualities of both his mentors, who taught him while he was their assistant: William Christie’s gift of clearly interpenetrating and structuring the music and Marc Minkowski’s charisma and rampant energy….an all round talent.”
www.ndrkultur.de, February 2009
“The conductor glows with articulate fragility, nuanced tenderness, polished dramatic art.… and with consistent accuracy and veracity… More of this!”
www.classiquenews.com, February 2009
“...so sophisticated”
Bremer Tageszeitung, September 2008
“Rhorer…obviously feels that sparkle, grace, and élan are serious virtues. The marches were so light and graceful they sounded like minuets. The minuets themselves bounced with gaiety.”
Broad Street Review, March 2008