Christophe Monniot

Born in Caen in 1970, Christophe Monniot has established himself in the French jazz landscape through a career in which writing, improvisation and a taste for atypical forms advance together. Trained first on trumpet and then on saxophone at the Caen Conservatory, before a spell at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Paris and studies in musicology in Rouen, Christophe Monniot develops a language anchored in contemporary jazz, with a significant place for improvised music, timbral deviations and oblique constructions. Playing mainly alto and baritone saxophone, he made a name for himself with Tous Dehors by Laurent Dehors, then within the Campagnie des musiques à ouïr with Rémi Sciuto and Denis Charolles, a trio where humor, writing and formal freedom intersect. He also appears alongside Daniel Humair, Stéphan Oliva, Patrice Caratini, Fred Pallem or in the Orchestre National de Jazz directed by Paolo Damiani between 2000 and 2002. In parallel, Christophe Monniot leads several personal projects such as Monio Mania, Ozone with Emil Spányi, or Station Mir with Didier Ithursarry and Guillaume Roy. His discography under his name or as leader includes notably Princesse fragile (2001), Ozone SM (2006), This Is C’est La Vie (2010), Station Mir (2012), Une nouvelle terre (2017), Jericho Sinfonia (2018) and Six Migrant Pieces (2023).