Biography
“one of those special talents that comes along once in a lifetime” (Toronto Star)
“From the passionate opening declamation, the Canadian violinist was fully in sync with Saint-Saëns’ lyricism and Romantic flair. He surmounted the score’s acrobatic demands with ease, and his youthful showmanship never subsumed the larger musical narrative.” (Chicago Classical Review)
Described as “immaculate, at once refined and impassioned,” (ArtsAtlanta) violinist Blake Pouliot (pool-YACHT) has anchored himself among the ranks of classical phenoms. A tenacious young artist with a passion that enraptures his audience in every performance, Pouliot has established himself as “one of those special talents that comes along once in a lifetime” (Toronto Star).
Blake Pouliot’s 2023/24 symphonic highlights include Shostakovich 1, Bruch 1, Tchaikovsky, Korngold and Sibelius concerti across the US and Canada with Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal with Roderick Cox, Artis-Naples and NAC Ottawa with Alexander Shelley, Quebec City Symphony and Clemens Schuldt, Aspen Festival amongst others.
In Europe this season, Pouliot makes his Spanish debut with the Philharmonic Orchestra of Spain at the Teatro Monumental in Madrid, performing the Tchaikovsky concerto with Rossen Milanov alongside which Pouliot will also play-direct Piazzolla’s The Four Seasons in a separate chamber programme.
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. ”
