
Pierre-Laurent Aimard is one of the leading pianists associated
with the mainstream European avant-garde of the last third of the
20th century and the early 21st century. As a student at the Paris
Conservatory, he won four first prizes. His teacher was Yvonne
Loriod, wife of composer and theory teacher Olivier Messiaen.
Aimard's studies with Loriod gave him a close association with
Messiaen, resulting in Aimard becoming a leading interpreter of
Messiaen's piano music. After graduation from the Paris
Conservatory, Aimard went on to London for further studies with
Maria Curcia. At Curcia's suggestion, Aimard went to Budapest,
Hungary, to pursue composition studies with György Kurtág, one of
that country's leading "advanced" composers. In 1973, Aimard won
first prize at the Olivier Messiaen International Competition, and
shortly thereafter began his international concert career. His
recitals were noted for their evenly balanced emphasis on the
traditional repertoire and the newest music, often illuminating
similarities and links between them. In 1976, Pierre Boulez, at
this point an internationally famous conductor who had left the
podium of the New York Philharmonic to take over the new IRCAM
organization in Paris, suggested the founding of an ensemble to be
permanently attached to it. Upon receiving government approval, he
established Ensemble InterContemporain, one of the leading
avant-garde ensembles in the world, inviting Aimard to become its
regular pianist. Aimard accepted, remaining in that position for 18
years. During the ensemble's appearances in America in 1986, he
performed as soloist in Boulez's composition Rèpons in New York,
Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, and Chicago. In 1988 at the
B.A.M. concerts in New York he performed Messiaen's Oiseaux
exotiques and Philippe Manoury's La Partition du ciel et de l'enfer
in Carnegie Hall. He has also appeared as a piano soloist in
concerto performances of traditional repertory. In that capacity he
has performed with many of the world's great orchestras, including
the Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, Boston Symphony, San
Francisco Symphony, Toronto Symphony, London Philharmonic, Berlin
Philharmonic, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Orchestre de Paris, and the
St. Petersburg Philharmonic. His appearances in international music
festivals tend to center on unusual repertory; he has played at
Tanglewood, Salzburg, the Berlin Festival, the Edinburgh Festival,
the Autumn Festival of Paris, and the Cologne Triennial Festival.
Upon leaving the Ensemble InterContemporain, he announced a concert
series in Paris and Lyon called "Piano in the 20th Century." In the
course of its eight concerts, he presented 24 works in diverse 20th
century styles. He followed the success of this venture with
several other such concert series, including one devoted to duet
performances, another tracing the influence of Johann Sebastian
Bach over the centuries, and an innovative exploration of music in
time and space that combined ancient music, ethnic music forms,
classical music, and film music. Conductors in that series included
Kent Nagano, Christoph von Dohnányi, Pierre Boulez, and Peter
Eötvös. He has recorded extensively on the Deutsche Grammophon,
Erato, Sony, and Auvidis labels, among others. For Sony he has
undertaken a series of recordings of the complete piano music of
Hungarian composer György Ligeti. In addition, he has produced
television films popularizing and explaining music of his time.
Aimard has served as the artistic director of the Aldeburgh
Festival (beginning in 2009) and continued appearing with ensembles
around the world, including the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and
orchestras in Chicago and Cleveland.