Biography

Sébastien Hurtaud is a French cellist born in La Rochelle into a family of music lovers and a brother who is a lyric tenor. Vibrating, transmitting, travelling and creating are at the heart of the young cellist's career. As a soloist and chamber musician, he travels the world invited by major orchestras and festivals and also shares the stage with his pianist wife Paméla Hurtado in a duo.

Trained at the Paris Conservatoire in the class of JM Gamard and Michel Strauss, then at the Royal Northern College of Music with Karine Georgian, his playing is inspired by these two great cello schools.
Influenced by the world of opera, it is at the Monnaie opera house that he made his first steps as guest solo cellist but very quickly turned to a career as a soloist.

His latest performances with prestigious orchestras have allowed him to meet new audiences in many countries and to affirm a career in full expansion. We have heard him in Richard Strauss' Don Quixote with the Katowice orchestra, Gulda's concerto with the Bratislava Philharmonic, Dvorak's concerto with the Metz orchestra, Elgar's concerto with the New Zealand National orchestra, Jacques Offenbach's Military concerto with the Brittany orchestra, Boccherini's concertos with the Panama City chamber orchestra, the orchestra of the Garde Républicaine at the Invalides, etc...

Winner of major international competitions Naumburg Foundation in New York, Aldo Parisot, Sébastien Hurtaud is the only Frenchman to have won the prestigious Adam cello competition in New Zealand. He then met his mentor, the great German conductor Werner-Andreas Albert, with whom he played Schostakovich's concerto n1 op.107.

The critics were full of praise for the French artist:
“Such expressive playing” (Forbes), “Such passion in his playing” (Gramophone), “A powerful style” (BBC Mag), “Elegant and driven” (Strad Mag), “Sébastien Hurtaud grasps the work with his full hands, as André Navarra once did, a great sound, ample, deep, that says as much as it sings” (Artamag), “The Virtuosity of a Feuerman and the soul of a Rostropovich” (Fanfare Magazine).

The Naxos label has specifically asked the French cellist to record the almost complete works for cello and piano by Paul Hindemith with his wife Paméla Hurtado. The Hindemith cello works remains one of the most downloaded albums in the Naxos Library. These various recordings are widely broadcast on radio stations in the USA, Latin America, New Zealand, France, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Spain, etc... and the appearance in Vincent Josse's Grand Atelier on France Inter in a duet with his pianist wife Paméla Hurtaud to celebrate the armistice of the First World War made a strong impression on listeners.

During a meeting in Manchester in 2004, Mistlav Rostropovich urged the young soloist to create the works of his contemporaries. The humorous Russian cello legend invited him to sleep on the mats of the greatest composers of his time until they open their doors to you and write a masterpiece. Since then, the French soloist has never ceased to defend the classical repertoire while creating works by Youli Galperine, Jonathan Grimbert, Lucas Debargues, Thomas Schwan, Simon Sargon, Jose Elizondo, etc...

The meeting with the New Zealand composer Gareth Farr and the creation of the «Concerto Chemin des Dames», subsequently recorded for the Rubicon Classics label with the Elgar concerto, marked an artistic turning point in the performer's career, creating a real bridge between works of the past and those of the present. This recording was made with Australian conductor Ben Northey and the New Zealand National Orchestra.

During the pandemic in 2020 Sébastien Hurtaud premiered the American composer Scott Ordway's work for cello and piano. The cellist has created an international online programme to help young cellists who want to become professionals. Dutch, American, Venezuelan and Korean students participate in the programme and recently two of these students have been accepted by Oberlin University and Minnesota University.

The 2021 season will be mainly marked by a tour with the Orchestre des Pays de Savoie, a residency at Gettysburg College and the recording of his next CD.

Sébastien Hurtaud is involved as a performer via the association « Tournesol, Artists in the hospital ».