A French composer born March 12, 1980 in Brest.
With a diploma from the Paris Conservatory in 2005, Yves Chauris won the Pierre Cardin Prize (2008) before taking up two residences, first at the Casa de Velázquez (2008-2010) then at the Villa Kujoyama (2011).
As a composer with a care for colour, he brings a particular attention to detail and the search for unusual tone-colours. His thought processes hinge on the frontier between statism and directionality by giving a crucial role to silence. Chauris is fond of poetry, notably that of Stéphane Mallarmé in Solitude, récif, étoile for piano and ensemble (2002) and of Paul Celan in Entre toujours et jamais for orchestra (2005). He composes according to his encounters, as can be be seen in Ripples I and II for the double bass player Yann Dubost and D’arbres, de ténèbres, de terre for the cellist Jean-Guihen Queyras and the pianist Alexander Melnikov (first performed at the Carnegie Hall in New York in 2017). His works bear the imprint of civilisations, of history and of the nature of the sites with which he is imbued, notably in the course of his residences and travels: Une ville sous l’eau, premiered by the Orchestre National de Lille in 2011; Shakkei, string quartet n° 2, premiered by the Tana Quartet at the festival Les Musiques in Marseilles in 2013; Un minimum de monde visible, first performed by the Ensemble Intercontemporain at the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam in 2014; Why so quiet, premiered by the SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg at the Donaueschinger Musiktage in 2015; Cantique for the ensemble Sillages, commissioned by the French State (2016).
