MULSANT Florentine (1962)

A French composer born March 27, 1962 in Dakar.

Having many times tried out the keyboard of the family piano, to which she felt an irrepressible attraction, Florentine Mulsant entered the Paris Conservatory where she studied for twelve years. From here, with Alain Bancquart as teacher, to the Schola Cantorum with Allain Gaussin, via some masterclasses abroad, notably in Sienna with Franco Donatoni, she built up a solid experience of composing. This enabled her not only to go beyond improvisation but also to acquire precious tools that did not, however, make her lose sight of the basics, i.e. the development of a personal musical style in which expression plays a fundamental role. For Florentine Mulsant, the affective presence of the creative artiste in his compositions together with music of strong character are part of those essential components that drive her approach to composition. Solo works (Sonata for cello, op. 27), chamber music (String Quartet, op. 26), the symphonic repertory (Symphony for strings, op. 32): Mulsant’s catalogue comprises some forty works, in which expressive necessity is accompanied by strict demands with regard to the quality of the form and the musical ideas. After various experiences as a teacher – notably of harmony and counterpoint at the University of Paris IV- Sorbonne – she now devotes herself exclusively to composition, and has received many awards including a recent Nadia and Lili Boulanger Prize from the Académie des Beaux-arts (2011).