Francesco Filidei (1973) was born in Pisa. He graduated from the Luigi Cherubini Conservatory in Florence and from the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris. As an organist and composer, he has been invited to participate in major contemporary music festivals worldwide. His works have been performed by a number of world-class orchestras, including the WDR, SWR, RSO Wien, ORT, RAI, the Tokyo Philharmonic, the BRSO as well as the Philharmonic Orchestras of Monte Carlo, Nice, Picardie, Helsinki, Vilnius and Warsaw, to name but a few. His works have also been played by most of the world’s the leading specialized ensembles (Ensemble Modern, Ensemble Intercntemporain, Klangforum, Musikfabrik etc…) at venues such as the Philharmonie in Berlin, Köln, Essen, Hamburg, Cité de la Musique in Paris, Suntory Hall and the Tokyo Opera House, Theaterhaus in Vienna, Herkulessaal in Munich, Auditorium Parco della Musica di Roma, Tonhalle in Zurich, Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, Opéra de Rennes, Opéra Comique in Paris and the Teatro alla Scala in Milan.
He has received numerous awards including the 2006 Salzburg Music Förderpreisträger, the 2007 Prix Takefu, the 2009 Siemens Förderpreis, the 2011 International Rostrum of Composers UNESCO Picasso-Miro Medal, the 2015 Abbiati Award, Les Grands Prix Internationaux du Disque in 2016 for his album Forse, an award by the Simone and Cino Del Duca Foundation in 2018 and the SWR Orchesterpreis in 2021 during the 100th Donaueschinger Musiktage for his Oratorio The red Death based on a novel by Edgar Allan Poe.
In 2005 Filidei received a grant from the Akademie Schloss Solitude; in 2006 and 2007 he was a member of the Casa de Velàzquez; in 2012-2013 he was a Pensionnaire at Villa Medici; in 2015 he was invited by the DAAD to stay in Berlin for a year. Filidei has also been composer-in-residence for numerous ensembles and music festivals.
Filidei is also active in teaching and has taught composition at the Royaumont Foundation’s Voix Nouvelles program, the University of Iowa, Takefu (Tokyo), the International Academy in Tchaikovsky City (Russia), Darmstädter Ferienkurse (Germany), and at numerous institutions and universities throughout the world (Ircam, Cnsmdp, Esmuc, Musikene, The conservatory of Strasbourg and Moscow, the University of Berlin (UDK), the universities Hannover, Stuttgart, Graz, San Diego, Tokyo, Hong Kong amongst many others).
In 2016 he was named Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the French Ministry of Culture.
In an opinion poll conducted by Classic Voice in 2017 consulting one hundred important figures in the music world, Francesco Filidei was named as one of the ten most interesting composers in the international scene.
Filidei joined the I Teatri Foundation of Reggio Emilia (Italy) as music consultant in 2018 and the Villa Medici in Rome as Artistic Director of the controtempo festival of contemporary music.
In 2022 he is nominated composer in residence at the Genova Opera House, (Teatro Carlo Felice) for three years.
Filidei’s first opera, Giordano Bruno, made its world premiere in 2015 in Porto (Portugal), and has been performed in theaters throughout Europe since then. In 2024, a completely new production is expected. His latest opera, L’inondation, with a libretto by Joel Pommerat, was composed for the 2019 season at the Opéra Comique in Paris, Rennes and Nantes. L’Inondation will be performed again in 2023 in Paris and Luxemburg.
Filidei’s works are published by Rai Com and, since 2018, by Casa Ricordi.
