Born in 1993, Jacques Pérez began his musical studies in his hometown of Bordeaux. While still in school, he received viola lessons as well as lessons in chamber music, harmony and contemporary music. He then moved to the Conservatoire national supérieur musique et danse (CNSMD) in Lyon in the class of Françoise Gneri, graduating with honors in 2017. He also studied chamber music there with Yovan Markovitch (Quatuor Ysaÿe), Agnès Sulem (Quatuor Rosamonde) and Zoltán Tóth (Quatuor Ravel). Jacques Pérez is currently studying at the Zurich University of the Arts in the class of Lawrence Power as part of a master’s degree program for soloists.
In 2015, he studied at the University of Montreal in Canada with Jutta Puchhammer. For the summer semester 2016 he was invited by Hariolf Schlichtig to study in his class at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater in Munich. He also participated in several master classes given by renowned professors, including Bruno Pasquier, Hariolf Schlichtig, Hartmut Rohde, Tasso Adamopoulos, Garth Knox, Tatjana Mazurenko, Barbara Westphal and Brian Bacon.
The young violist is a member of the Orchestre Victor Hugo and the Orchestre de Chambre de Lyon, where he is principal violist. He also regularly participates in numerous other chamber music projects. He performs as a chamber musician or soloist at various festivals, including Musique en Graves, Festival des monts de la Madeleine and Bohinj Summer Music Festival. In the process, he has already played with artists such as Françoise Gneri, Eva-Nina Kozmus, Vincent Balse, Sophie Labandibar, Runa ′t Hart and Stéphane Rougier.
As a prizewinner of the Mécénat Musical Société Générale Foundation, Jacques Pérez received on loan a viola made by Philippe Mahu with the engraving “Gold Medal in Mittenwald 2010”, on which he has been playing ever since.