Court Circuit was founded in 1991 by composer Philippe Hurel and conductor Pierre-André Valade. The ensemble, made up of top-level musicians, was quickly recognized as an outstanding ensemble, originally focusing on the music of the “spectralism” movement. Today the ensemble plays a broader contemporary repertoire with strong emphasis on living French composers. The ensemble is in fact proud of its “French sound”.

One important aspect of Court Circuit activities is pedagogy. The ensemble has regular collaboration with the conservatories of Paris and suburbs. In residency at the department of Hauts-de-Seine since 2012, the ensemble has built many projects linked to its programming, with several conservatories and organisations of this area, thus reaching a large new audience.

Another aspect is Court Circuits experiments with musical theatre. “The future of contemporary music is in collaboration with other art forms” artistic director Philippe Hurel says. Following this philosophy the ensemble has experimented with various ways of transforming the concert into theatrical events, but the concert as a social event is important for Court Curcuit too. In fact this French ensemble usually drink cocktails with the audience after the concerts!