Elsa Grether
Territories : General management

To say Grether has met her brief is an understatement. This is easily my favourite solo recital in quite some while. » C. Gardner, Gramophone, Nov 2017

“Grether’s playing is technically outstanding, dynamic and vivid, with a silky timbre. »
Pizzicato Magazine, September 2017

« The young French violinist Elsa Grether here gives the most passionate performances of three of Ernest Bloch’s works (…). It would be hard to imagine more moving performances of all this music than those of Grether (…). I look forward to hearing more of Elsa Grether.”
Edward Greenfield, Gramophone, September 2013

French violinist Elsa Grether is regularly invited to prestigious festivals in France and abroad. As a soloist with orchestra, she has played concertos from Bach to Beethoven, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Sibelius, Prokofiev, among others, with the Orchestre Symphonique de Mulhouse, Orchestre Symphonique de Cannes, Lebanese Philharmonic Orchestra, Briansk Symphony Orchestra, Indiana Philharmonic, Deutsch-Tschechicher Chamber Orchestra…

She has given recitals at Carnegie Weill Hall in New-York, the Folle Journée de Nantes, Printemps des Arts de Monte-Carlo, Flâneries Musicales de Reims, Menton Festival, Festival de Sully et du Loiret, Festival de Rocamadour, Festival des Forêts, Festival des Abbayes en Lorraine, Festival de Musique sacrée de Perpignan, Festival Berlioz, Grandes Heures de Cluny, Pâques à l’Abbaye de Fontevraud, Musicales de Normandie, Festival d’Arténétra, Festival Lille Clef de Soleil, Salle Cortot in Paris, Bozar and Flagey in Brussels, Festival de Wallonie, Festival Musiques en Eté in Geneva, Radio Suisse Romande, Palazzetto Bru-Zane in Venice…

Among her highlights in 2018-19, she gave recitals at the Folle Journée in Nantes, Flagey Brussels, Rocamadour Festival, Musicales de Normandie, Altmark Festspiele (Germany), played Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto on tour with Briansk Symphony Orchestra, Sibelius Concerto with the Lebanese Philharmonic Orchestra in Beyrouth, Mozart 5th Concerto with Orchestre de Cannes. Her recent and coming engagements in 2021/22 include Sibelius Violin Concerto with François-Xavier Roth and La Jeune Symphonie de l’Aisne, return invitations with Orchestre Symphonique de Mulhouse under Jacques Lacombe in Tomasi Violin Concerto, recitals in Paris Invalides, Paris Petit Palais, Salle Cortot, Arsenal de Metz, Montauban, Avignon, Mulhouse, Orléans, Reims, Liège (Belgium), KonzertGut Concert Series (Germany), Festival des Abbayes de Lorraine.

Her 3 CDs “Poème mystique” (Bloch and Pärt) with pianist Ferenc Vizi, “French Resonance” (Pierné, Vierne and Fauré) with François Dumont and “Kaleidoscope” for solo violin (Bach, Ysaye, Honegger, Tôn-Thât Tiet, Khatchaturian, Albeniz) were released in 2013, 2015 and 2017 by Fuga Libera/Outhere. All three CDs received unanimous acclaim and were awarded the highest distinctions: “5 Diapasons” in Diapason Magazine, “4 stars” in Classica Magazine as well as excellent reviews from Gramophone, Pizzicato Magazine, La Libre Belgique…

Her 4rth CD, dedicated to the work of S. Prokofiev together with pianist David Lively,was released in april 2019 (Fuga Libera/Outhere) and already received unanimous acclaim (“CD of the week” and FFFF in Télérama, 5 Diapasons, 5 stars in Classica Magazine, 5 from Pizzicato Magazine, Musikzen, Concertclassic, Classiquenews, Crescendo Magazine…).

Her next CD will be dedicated to Maurice Ravel’s entire works for violin and piano as well as rare transcriptions, with pianist David Lively. It will be released in September 2022 on label Aparté.

In 2009 Elsa won the Pro Musicis Award in Paris by unanimous decision of the jury. She has held scholarships from a number of foundations, Fondation Safran pour la Musique, Fondation Banque Populaire, the Fondation de France (Prix Oulmont), the Fondation Cziffra, the Fondation Bleustein-Blanchet pour la Vocation. She was awarded the Josef Gingold full scholarship at Indiana University. In 1993 she was prizewinner at the Young Soloists’ Competition organized by the RTBF in Brussels.

She is regularly heard on radios such as France Musique, France Inter, Musiq3 and RTS Suisse and was the subject of a program in Alain Duault’s television series "Toute la musique qu’ils aiment" (France 3).

Born in Mulhouse, France, after being awarded a Premier Prix in violin by unanimous decision of the jury at the Conservatoire de Paris-CRR on her fifteenth birthday, Elsa’s lively curiosity prompted her to continue her training abroad, with Ruggiero Ricci at the Salzburg Mozarteum and then in the United States with Mauricio Fuks at Indiana University and Donald Weilerstein at the New England Conservatory in Boston. She subsequently received guidance from Régis Pasquier in Paris.