Ismaël Margain was born in 1992 in Sarlat, Dordogne, where he began his musical training at the age of four. Multi-instrumentalist (piano, flute, saxophone) and passionate about all kinds of music (improvised or not), he obtained his piano and chamber music prizes at the Limoges Conservatory. The pianist and conductor Vahan Mardirossian, with whom he has been working since the age of eight, then introduced him to his master Jacques Rouvier, who helped Ismaël prepare for the entrance exam to the Paris Conservatory.

 

Received unanimously, he continued this collaboration and chose to enter Nicholas Angelich's class. After the latter's departure from the CNSMDP, he joined Roger Muraro's class. 

 

Ismaël won his first competition at the age of 7 at the "Musicales de Caen". After many other prizes (Arcachon, Maryse Cheilan...), he is the winner in 2011 of the "Génération SPEDIDAM" International Competition in Aix en Provence; his diploma is awarded to him by Aldo Ciccolini, president of the jury, after his performance in the final of Beethoven's 4th concerto, under the baton of George Pehlivanian. He immediately offered him the opportunity to play Ravel's Concerto in G with him at the Touquet International Music Masters 2012. But the general public really discovered him in December 2012 during the final of the Long-Thibaud Competition where he played Mozart's Concerto No. 23 with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and won the Audience Prize and the 3rd Grand Prix du jury. 

 

In 2011, the Limoges Opera invited him to compose a Schubert/Liszt recital programme. He was then invited to the festivals of Deauville, Pablo Casals de Prades, the Haut Limousin festival, the Tons voisins d'Albi, the Festival de l'Epau, the Chopin festival in Paris... He then gave a recital at the Palais de l'Athénée in Geneva. 

 

Ismaël Margain is the winner of the Clos Vougeot 2012 festival grant and forms an ensemble with soloists from the Metropolitan Opera of New York. He performs regularly at the Singer Polignac Foundation, with which he signed an artistic residency agreement in 2012, and where he records his first CD dedicated to Schubert.