François-Xavier Poizat

Born in 1989, he is a graduate of the Haute-Écoles de Musique in Geneva and Hamburg, the Juilliard School in New York and the Accademia Santa Cecilia in Rome, where he studied with Alexeï Golovin, Evgeni Koroliov, Nelson Goerner, Matti Raekallio and Benedetto Lupo.

He has performed in 28 different countries in venues such as Geneva’s Victoria Hall, Zurich’s Tonhalle, Berlin’s Konzerthaus and Philharmonie, the Seoul Art Center, the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory and New York’s Carnegie Hall, and at festivals such as La Roque d’Anthéron (France), the Pacific Music Festival (Japan), the Progetto Martha Argerich, Lavaux Classics and Septembre Musical de Montreux (Switzerland).

Grand Prize at the International Wettbewerb Romantische Sterne 2004 in Kassel, Prix Jeune Soliste 2007 des Radios Francophones Publiques, 1st Prize at the Internationaler Musikwettbewerb für die Jugend 2009 in Oldenburg and at the Elise Meyer Competition 2009 in Hamburg, Special Jury Prize at the Tchaikovsky Competition 2011 in Moscow, Soloist Prize 2012 of the Pourcent-Culturel Migros in Zürich and finalist at the Clara Haskil Competition 2013 in Vevey, he has performed numerous concertos with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande and the Orchestre de la Suisse Italienne, the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, the Poznan Philharmonic, the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, the National Chamber Orchestras of Armenia and Lithuania and the Philharmonia Orchestra in London under conductors such as Bernard Labadie, Philippe Béran, Thierry Fischer, Neeme Järvi, Lukasc Borowicz and Frédéric Chaslin.

He has recorded 5 CDs for the Naxos, Ars Produktion and Piano Classics labels, and has been director of the Puplinge Classique Festival in Geneva for 13 years and of the Stravinsky Festival in Voreppe since 2021. He enjoys jazz and martial arts, which he has been practicing for 20 years. A 6-CD set of complete Ravel works for piano (including the two concertos with London’s Philharmonia Orchestra, chamber music and vocal music) will be released in September 2024 on the Aparté label.