Pierre de Bethmann

Born in Boulogne‑Billancourt in 1965, Pierre de Bethmann was initially self‑taught before attending the Berklee College of Music in Boston, and from 1994 chose to devote himself entirely to jazz. A pianist and composer, he has developed a language situated between contemporary jazz, post‑bop and orchestral writing, with a marked attention to timbre, the development of short motifs and sometimes asymmetric rhythmic constructions, without losing the fluidity of collective playing. That same year he founded Prysm with Christophe Wallemme and Benjamin Henocq, a trio that drew attention after winning the Concours national de jazz de La Défense, and was documented on the albums Prysm (1995), Second Rhythm (1998), Time (1999) and On Tour (2001). He then broadened his scope with the Ilium series, from Ilium (2003) to Go (2012), while performing alongside musicians such as David El Malek, Moutin Réunion, Pierrick Pédron, Olivier Ker Ourio, David Liebman and Rick Margitza. In 2013 he launched the Medium Ensemble, a ten‑piece formation heard on Sisyphe (2014), Exo (2016) and Todhe Todhe (2019). In parallel, his trio with Sylvain Romano and Tony Rabeson explores the standard repertoire in the Essais series, started in 2015, while his recent projects include At Barloyd’s (2018), Chaud‑froid (2022) and the quartet Credo (2024).