Françoise Lasserre Biography
After studying mathematics, Françoise Lasserre went on to pursue her musical education with the transverse flute as well as analysis, composition and orchestra direction at the Ecole Normale in Paris. Luck brought her the opportunity to collaborate with Michel Corboz, for whom she trained amateur choirs, and to be one of the few singers invited by Philippe Herreweghe, to found the Chapelle Royale.
In 1986, at the instigation of the Champagne-Ardenne region, Françoise Lasserre created Akadêmia, whom she regularly directs in France and abroad. She has conducted fifteen recordings, with a predilection for Monteverdi and Schütz. Her work has been hailed by a number of awards: First Prize in the Palestrina competition (1994), a wide range of laudatory labels…
She collaborates with instrumental ensembles such as La Fenice and Concerto Italiano; organizations like the Monte Carlo Ballet (choreographies by Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Jean-Christophe Maillot, based on works of Schütz and Monteverdi); and the Comédie de Saint-Etienne (Director, Jean-Claude Berutti); as well as theatre directors (François Rancillac with the creation of Tombeau de Molière (Molière’s Grave) in Mexico.
In 2013, she has created Orfeo, crossing the Ganges in Delhi and in Paris, a version of the Monteverdi’s Orfeo with Indian and Europeans artists. The opera will be performed in 2016 in the Bonjour India and Namasté France festivals. In 2014, in co-production with the Festival de la Chaise-Dieu, she will conduct a literary and musical creation based on the Gospels of the Passion, with the text by Jean-Pierre Siméon and the music by Johann Sebastian Bach, taken from the St Matthew Passion, the St John Passion, and the cantatas.
Recreating 17th and 18th century vocal or instrumental works—either major or unknown—is her main vocation with Akademia.