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It is perhaps not surprising that pianist Pascal Rogé -- a third-generation French musician -- has mastered the modern French piano repertoire. What is surprising is the actual breadth of his repertoire and the young age at which he excelled.

In 1962, at the age of 11, he was admitted to the Paris Conservatoire, having previously studied with his mother. By the age of 15, he had won first prize for both piano and chamber music. At 18, he performed solo recitals in both Paris and London. But his major breakthrough was the first prize in the Jacques Thibaud International Competition in 1971. Several European engagements followed, and in 1974 he made his first tour to the United States, returning nearly every season. He has also become a favorite in Australia and Japan, where he has made over 20 tours.

Rogé's particular strengths lie in his sensitive and personal interpretations of 20th century French composers; he has made recordings of complete cycles of Ravel, Poulenc, and Satie, among others. His repertoire also includes d'Indy, Saint-Saëns, as well as the great German masters -- Haydn, Mozart, Brahms, and Beethoven. His recordings have received numerous awards, including the Grand Prix du Disque and an Edison award for the Ravel concertos. His first volume of Poulenc won the 1988 Gramophone award for Best Instrumental Recording, and his collaboration with Chantal Juillet and Truls Mørk won the 1997 Gramophone award for Best Chamber Music recording. In the new century, he began a new recording project for Onyx that included a complete Debussy cycle. He also began performing and touring with his wife, Ami Rogé. The pair commissioned a two piano concerto from Matthew Hindson, which they premiered in 2011.

He has taught at the Académie in Nice, but a busy international schedule has kept him from consistent teaching. More stylist than virtuosic, his solo pianism has been recognized for its decidedly French elegance, while his collaboration with orchestras has been noted for its faultless musicianship, and made him a favorite of conductors ranging from Charles Dutoit to Lorin Maazel to Kurt Masur.

Bertrand de Billy, while conducting and recording a sizable amount of instrumental music over the years, is generally associated with opera. In the new millennium he has devoted much time to the works of Wagner, appearing on a half-dozen or so DVDs of Wagner's operas, including a complete Ring. Massenet, Gounod, and other French composers have figured significantly in his operatic repertory, as well. In the instrumental realm, his tastes are varied and take in Mozart sacred works, Beethoven and Mahler symphonies, Debussy, Ravel, and Gershwin, and contemporary composers such as Rihm, Berio, Gruber, and Henze. He has led performances at many of the leading opera houses in Europe and the U.S., and has also conducted an array of orchestras in France, Germany, and Austria. De Billy has made numerous recordings, most for major labels like EuroArts, Deutsche Grammophon, EMI, Teldec, and Orfeo.

De Billy was born in Paris in 1965. As a child he studied violin and viola and also regularly sang in a boys choir. He received his musical education in Paris, played in orchestras there, and then eventually conducted several Paris-based ensembles.

In 1986 he was appointed conductor of the Orchestre Symphonique des Jeunesse en Ile de France. He served four seasons in this post, during the last of which he worked with conductor/pianist Philippe Entremont. He served for a short time thereafter as an assistant to Pierre Dervaux at the Orchestre Colonne in Paris.

De Billy's debut in the operatic realm came at the 1991 Orviedo Festival in Spain, where he led an acclaimed performance of La Traviata. He returned to Spain the following year to enthusiastic response when he conducted Bizet's The Pearl Fishers at the Barcelona Festival.

De Billy's watershed breakthrough in opera came in 1993: that year he was appointed principal conductor and general music director at the Anhaltisches Theater in Dessau, a post he held until 1995. At the Vienna Volksoper, de Billy led a highly acclaimed Carmen in 1994 and went on to serve as music director there from 1996-1998.

From 1999-2004 de Billy was chief conductor at the Teatro del Liceu in Barcelona, where he led a celebrated Ring cycle. From 2002 until 2009 he served as principal conductor of the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra. De Billy's 2007 performance of Massenet's Manon at the Teatro del Liceu with Anna Netrebko was a great success. His extensive discography includes recordings of Mozart's Da Ponte operas, Fidelio, Faust, Don Carlos, La bohème, Dialogues des Carmélites, and Ariane et Barbe-Bleue, as well as orchestral works by Schubert, Dvorák, Mahler, Gershwin, and Berio.