My carreer as a musician, be it as a pianist or composer, was always guided by discoveries and opportunities that I have strived to grab without prejudice. Musical, human and cultural encounters all have shaped my personality, all of them leaving their mark.
My musical language was not built upon an academic background. It was built following the confluences that have inspired me always, sometimes treading unexpected new roads. It is this eclectism, highly claimed, which has always shown me the way towards progress and accomplishment. Nothing about music is foreign to me, it is my country, my daily bread and most of all the sacred path upon which I have decided to embark with fervor and wonder.I was lucky enough to start as a popular entertainment pianist, at age 16, while my teachers at music academy were still trying in vain to make me fit into a box.
This was a turning point in making me open to a wider world, one that ignored ageold interdicts, affiliations and exclusions. The discovery of jazz was then the ferment of an evolution which brought me back towards classical and contemporary music, around age 30. Gifted with an unquenchable curiosity, a solid analytical mind and a raw sensitivity, it was easy to draw from my many adventures the material of my own expression.
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BIOGRAPHY
Eric Breton was born in Avignon, France, where he studied piano, harmony and counterpoint.
A piano student of Mrs Hélène Varszegi, he will later study composition and orchestration with Ivan Jullien, and orchestra conduction with Ernst Schelle. A prolific and eclectic composer, Eric Breton uses many different types of formations and has seen his work played internationally, be it in front of Pope John Paul II or US President Bill Clinton, thanks to prestigious collaborations (Lord Yehudi Menuhin, Maurice Jarre, Emir Nuhanovic, etc). In 1996, he is the recipient of the Sloboda Award for the Defense of Human Rights and Humanism in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Ambassador of Art and Culture of the city of Avignon in 1994, Eric Breton is also an Honorary Member of the Sarajevo Philharmonic Orchestra.
In addition to his instrumental works, he has a passion for voice, which has led him to compose over a hundred melodies on lyrics from Petrarch to Christian Bobin, but also Victor Hugo, Pablo Neruda, Frédéric Mistral and many others...
Great minds also have marked this atypical journey, Ernst Schelle, Yvan Jullien, Lord Yehudi Menuhin, Miguel-Angel Estrella, Maurice Jarre, and many others still. Some have been my teachers, some have been my partners, but all have fed me with their exemple, their humanity and their love for Art.The human voice has always held a very singular fascination upon me, a great portion of my creations is devoted to it and my musical thought often takes on an eminently vocal form.
Musicals, comic operas, cantatas, melodies have been my everyday, and my biggest future projects lead me towards opera, the greatest achievement. A taste for languages and travel has led me to compose in Latin, Provençal, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, and of course in French.After having been one of the first French musicians to use a synthesizer, and having long walked the halls of some of the greatest recording studios, it was natural for me to follow the various evolutions of computer technology applied to music. Evolutions which lead me today to collaborate with the artificial intelligence project AIVA, a musical composition algorithm.But this is just a start...
(traduction Julie Breton)