Overview

Zellig is an ensemble of soloists, personalities from highly diversified backgrounds. It was founded on the initiative of Thierry Pécou, a composer whose prodigious capacity for assimilation and taste for metamorphosis set the tone for the name of the ensemble itself: Zellig. It is inspired to the German selig (‘blessed’, ’in a state of beatitude’) and hints at Woody Allen’s Zelig film’s chameleon, thus suggesting the musicians‘ability to travel through time-periods and styles, and to adapt to the most diverse forms; most often going beyond the classic framework of the concert.

Forged from travel to travel, the music of Thierry Pécou - humanist and Nietzschean - calls for a formulation that would, in the sense of André Breton, tie back again art to magic. Thus inventing a modern, captivating and subtle form of ritual; of which the favoured performer undoubtedly is the ensemble Zellig; a concept very well represented by works, such as Outre-Mémoire, Hop et rats, Nanouk l'esquimau, En duo avec Ravel, Symphonie du Jaguar, Passeurs d'eau, Une rose a circle of kisses.

The multifaceted expression of Thierry Pécou’s works leads the Ensemble to work with soloists such as singer Sylvie Sullé, pianist Alexandre Tharaud, oboist François Leleux, the Amerindian-music duo Yaki Kandru; as well as artists from other disciplines: visual artists Jean-François Boclé, the poet Paul de Brancion, stage directors Ivan Moran and Christine Mananzar, or choreographers, such as Karine Saporta and Anne Dreyfus.

While exploring the chamber music repertoire from Haydn to Lutoslawski, Zellig consistently includes in its programmes composers of today, sometimes little known, in tune with the ensemble’s development. The ensemble Zellig has participated in the premieres of several symphonic works by Thierry Pécou: Symphonie de Jaguar as soloists with the Orchestre National d’Ile de France at Radio France’s ‘Présences 2003’ festival, and Voix Marines with the Orchestra of Brittany at ‘Les Rencontres Musicales de Pont-l’Abbé’. Zellig has performed in Italy, Spain, Portugal, South America and at Radio-France, the Auditorium du Louvre, Théâtre Silvia Monfort and the Cirque d'Hiver in Paris, at the Parvis Scène Nationale (Tarbes), T.N.M. La Criée (Marseilles), and at festivals such as ‘Colla Voce’ in Poitiers, Sacred Music Festival at the Abbey of Sylvanès, ‘Musica’ festival in Strasbourg, ‘Autumn in Normandy’, ‘Music and Heritage’ in Chinon, ‘Semaines Musicales de Quimper’ and ‘Les Musiques in Marseille.