Secession Orchestra
has been in residency since 2014
Clément Mao-Takacs conductor
Clément Mao-Takacs is one of the rising stars of the new generation of conductors.
He graduated from the Conservatoire Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris and the Accademia Chigiana in Sienna, is a laureate of the Bayreuth Festival and was awarded the Prize "Jeune Talent" by the Fondation del Duca (Institut de France / Académie des Beaux-Arts). In 2013, he was the first conductor to be laureate of the Fondation Cziffra.
He has been invited to be a guest conductor by Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Stavanger Symphony, Oslo Philharmonic, Odense Symphony, Orchestre des Pays de La Loire, Orchestre Symphonique de Bretagne, Festival Orchestra of Sofia, Avanti! Chamber Orchestra Finland, ICE Ensemble New York and Bit 20 Bergen. He made is debuts at the Orchestre de Paris in May 2018, conducting five concerts at short notice.
In 2011 he founded Secession Orchestra, of which he is both Artistic and Musical Director. Taking the ideals of the Viennese Secession movement as the starting point, the repertoire encompasses music from Mahler and Debussy through rarely performed scores to contemporary music. With stage director Aleksi Barrière he founded and leads the collective La Chambre aux échos, working on musical theatre and chamber opera. He also created and is Artistic Director of two festivals, INTERVALLES in Paris and TERRAQUÉ in Carnac, Brittany.
As a specialist of Kaija Saariaho’s music, he has conducted the world premiere and several national premieres of the chamber version of her opera La Passion de Simone, including performances in Bratislava, Saint-Denis, Lublin, Clermont- Ferrand, Copenhagen, New-York, Bergen and Nantes. He gave the world premiere of the chamber version of Quatre Instants which is also dedicated to him, the Danish premiere of the concerto Notes on Light, and regularly performs numerous works from her catalogue. In 2018, he conducted several times the concertos Aile du Songe and Graal Théâtre, and the first world recording of her sinfonic work Circle Map.
Clément Mao-Takacs’s recordings include Stockhausen’s Adieu for Crystal Classics, a disc of Jacques Ibert’s music for Timpani (awarded ‘5 diapasons’ by DIAPASON magazine). His latest releases include music by Debussy, Zemlinsky and Saariaho.
Clément Mao – Takacs is also a concert pianist and a composer.
Secession Orchestra
SECESSION ORCHESTRA is an elite formation of forty musicians. Under the musical and artistic direction of Clément Mao-Takacs, the orchestra promotes the repertoire from the 20th and 21st centuries, working with contemporary composers and on multiple collaborations and exchanges between the arts. Its skills led it to be invited in the most important concert halls such as Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Auditorium de Radio France, Collège des Bernardins, BOZAR (Bruxelles), and festivals in France and Europe: Festival de Saint-Denis, Festival de Deauville, Lisztomanias (Châteauroux), Tons Voisins (Albi), Maestri et Bambini (Montercarlo di Lucca, Italy), NOVALIS (Croatia) …
The activity of SECESSION ORCHESTRA was positively acclaimed from its debut for the excellent quality and didactic value of the various projects. On top of its Parisian symphonic concerts production, SECESSION ORCHESTRA performed together with famous artists including musicians as Renaud Capuçon, Thomas Hampson, Elsa Dreisig, Stéphane Degout, Jonas Vitaud and actors as Charles Berling, Fanny Ardant, Julie Depardieu...
Each cultural action being considered a social one, Secession Orchestra conveys a new vision: it aims at reshaping the traditional classical concert, putting forward conceptual programs and reinventing the link between musicians and the audience at the heart of society.
Since 2017, SECESSION ORCHESTRA has been a resident ensemble at Louvre Museum, Orsay Museum, Petit Palais and Singer-Polignac Foundation and is supported by DRAC Ile-de-France/Culture and Communication Ministry and Caisse des dépôts Bank.
Videos
Concerts at the Fondation Singer-Polignac
Outdoor concert: Baudelairiana | October 19, 2018
Seasonal concert: Baudelairiana | October 18, 2018
Outdoor concert: Autour de la 5e symphonie de Mahler | October 20, 2017
Seasonal concert: Autour de la 5e symphonie de Mahler | October 19, 2017
Workshop concert: La Nature est un temple | October 13, 2016
Seasonal concert: Odes à l'amour | June 23, 2016
Seasonal concert: Métamorphose symphonique | April 16, 2015
