Biography
“one of those special talents that comes along once in a lifetime” (Toronto Star)
Winner of the Grand Prize at the 2016 Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal Manulife Competition, Blake Pouliot is a Soloist-in-Residence at the Orchestre Métropolitain with whom he performed Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 5, conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin, as part of their digital series last year. 2021/22 culminated with his Philadelphia Orchestra debut, joining forces again with Nézet-Séguin in John Corigliano’s The Red Violin (Chaconne for Violin and Orchestra) in a special concert at the Kimmel Centre.
2022/23 symphonic highlights include a return to Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, sharing a stage with Angela Hewitt in Beethoven’s Triple Concerto. Other guest appearances across the US include performances of the Korngold, Paganini, Mendelssohn, Saint-Saëns concerti as well as Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy with Madison, Milwaukee, Arkansas, Bangor, Elgin, North Carolina, Oregon, Tacoma, and Westmoreland Symphony orchestras. Engagements from recent seasons include his aforementioned Philadelphia Orchestra debut and engagements with Boise Philharmonic, Omaha Symphony, Plano Symphony, Sarasota Orchestra and Winnipeg Symphony.
Read moreReviews
“The 29-year-old is one of the most expressive guest violinists to play with the Bangor orchestra in the past decade. He plays with his entire body — channeling the music from his toes up through his heart, down his arms and out through his deft fingers. […] Pouliot’s performance sets a high standard for future guest soloists.”
“Staggeringly sophisticated in his interpretation of French music, Pouliot showed in his Atlanta debut that the demands of the Sibelius Violin Concerto are well within his wheelhouse too. […] Pouliot played the opening of the first movement mezzo piano and without vibrato—a gauzy, barely audible thread of sound. His playing throughout was immaculate, at once refined and impassioned and characterized by the full use of his bow. Unreserved, he played the violin lovingly and with technical precision. Pouliot is also visually expressive in a distinctive way. When not playing it’s apparent that he’s listening, looking at the orchestra and responding almost as if he’s hearing their part for the first time.”
“Pouliot’s silvery tone carried weight even in the softest passages of the music [Ravel’s “Blues”], as he floated his melodies with the grace of a blues singer. […] Pouliot sculpted each phrase precisely to bring out the colors of Prutsman’s supple harmonies. In the finale, the duo tore through the driving figures with apt gypsy fire to bring the work to a rousing conclusion.”
“Pouliot puts the listener at ease and makes them receptive to what he has to say, executing the concerto with a superb sound and well-placed sweetness. Passing from admirable to overwhelming, there is even a little something in my ears that I can hardly define, a kind of brilliance, with sharp harmonics, and a singing strength in the upper register to equal that of the lower. ”
