Biography
Jean-Claude Gengembre is a French composer born in Lille in 1975. His catalogue includes around fifty works, from solo pieces and chamber music to compositions for large orchestra. His music is performed in Europe, the United States, and South Korea by major ensembles and symphony orchestras such as the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, the Orchestre National du Capitol de Toulouse, the Orchestre National de Montpellier Occitanie, the Orchestre National dʼAvignon–Provence, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Brass Quintet, the Local Brass Quintet, the Iberia Wind Quintet, the Bacchus Quintet, the Avesnois Choir, and Ensemble Kairos. He has also composed solo works for distinguished performers such as Ji-yoon Park, Nathan Mierdl, Marianna Bednarska, Vassilena Serafimova, Jae Yeon Won, Anne Leroy, and Mathieu Petit.
Jean-Claude Gengembre studied at the Conservatory in Lille, where he earned first prizes in percussion, analysis, writing, musical training, and orchestration, and then at the CNSMD of Paris, where he obtained first prizes in harmony and percussion. In 2023, he won 3rd prize at the Dieppe International Composition Competition for Wind Quintet. He was principal timpanist of the Orchestre National de Lille from 1996 to 2006 and has been principal timpanist of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France since 2007. He expresses his creativity through both composition and percussion, collaborating regularly with many composers on the creation of solo percussion works and chamber music.
His work as a composer is based on a search for color, rhythm, timbre, and sound material. His music is expressive, dynamic, playful, and rich with strong harmonic power.
For him, each new piece is an island, a field of exploration. He advocates for a direct expression of emotion, free from intellectualism, and aims to offer the audience and performers a new experience and a moment of shared emotion with every new project.
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His influences are numerous : the great Masters of the past like Ravel, Stravinsky, Shostakovich, and Bartók, but also contemporary composers with varied esthetics such as Pascal Dusapin, Thomas Adès, Bruno Mantovani, Jean-Pierre Drouet, and Arvo Pärt, among others.
Passionate about the arts in general – and particularly about literature and theatre, which play a significant role in his creation – Jean-Claude Gengembre is naturally drawn to multidisciplinary artistic forms. He regularly collaborates with other creators, dancers, writers, and photographers on original projects.
Pedagogy is also an important aspect of his work. He is professor of timpani at the Paris Conservatoire (CNSMDP). He was composer-in-residence at the Maurice Ravel Conservatory (Paris 13) in 2023 and at the Camille Saint-Saëns Conservatory (Paris 8) from 2024 to 2025. More than fifteen works were created during these residencies, the result of fruitful collaborations with students and professors from both conservatories.
His first musical tale, La Grenouille à grande bouche (The Big-Mouth Frog), was premiered by the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France in December 2024, performed by the Orchestre National de Montpellier–Occitanie in January 2025, and will be taken up by the Orchestre National du Capitol de Toulouse and the Orchestre National dʼAvignon–Provence during the 2025–26 season. Jean-Claude
Gengembreʼs works are published by Alfonce Production, Éditions du Petitpage, Gérard Billaudot, and Klarthe Editions.
