Matthieu Cognet, pianist (France)
Collaborative piano and art song interpretation;
French diction

Mr. Cognet studied at the Conservatoire Supérieur de Paris–CNR with Pierre REACH, while studying at the same time at the University of La Sorbonne (Master of Musicology with the highest honors). In 2004, after his graduation in Paris (1st Prize), he attended the Royal Conservatory of Brussels where he completed a Master of Music in Piano Performance in Jean-Claude Vanden Eynden's studio. He graduated in 2007 with High Distinction, ranking first in the final recital exam. In 2008 he moved to Bloomington, Indiana, where he pursued a Performer Diploma in Piano performance with Emile Naoumoff at Indiana University. He had the privilege to be one of the late Janos Starker's studio accompanists between 2008 and 2010 at Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and accompanied Joshua Bell's masterclasses in April 2009. He is currently pursuing a Doctor of Musical Arts degree at Stony Brook University, under the guidance of Professor Gilbert Kalish. He has regularly participated in master-classes in Europe with Jacques Rouvier at the Summer Academy of Nice (1998), Aquiles Delle-Vigne at the Mozarteum of Salzburg (2001), Dominique Merlet in France (2002, 2005), Boris Berman and Paul Badura-Skoda in Vila-seca, Spain (2011).

Mr. Cognet has participated in numerous competitions. In December 2009, he was one of the fifteen semifinalists of the Heida Hermanns International Piano Competition in Westport, Connecticut. He won the 1st Prize in the Travel Grant Competition in Bloomington in April 2010 and was semifinalist in the last edition of the Pozzoli International Piano Competition in Seregno, Italy, in September 2011. He is finalist and Gold Medal in the Forte International Competition at Carnegie Hall (Weill Hall) in New York City in February 2014 with the SCH Trio, which he founded with violinist Yoonmi HONG and cellist Zexun Shen in 2013.

Matthieu Cognet is also highly interested in the two-piano repertoire. In 1998, he was finalist and awarded 1st accessit in the four-hand piano section of the Concours Musical de France, with the Chinese pianist Bin Wang. Macha Kanza is his regular two-piano partner. They gave together several recitals in Belgium and in France. He regularly plays as a soloist and in chamber music, mainly in France, Belgium,·Spain, Italy and the United States. He recently performed at Steinway Hall and Weill Hall in New York City, and at the Chicago Cultural Center (The Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concerts) with Polish violinist Kinga Augustyn.

Session III