“Charisma, presence, technical mastery; Elsa de Lacerda’s violin radiates with a rich and captivating sound serving an imagination, a finesse and a freedom without limits”Tully Potter — The Strad
Biography
Winner of the Government Medal at the age of 14, Elsa de Lacerda won the Crédit Communal competition and performed a few months later as soloist with the l’Orchestre Royal Philharmonique de Liège. She then began studying under Endré Kleve at the Conservatoire Royal de Bruxelles, from which she graduated with five Premiers Prix and Diplômes Supérieurs avec Grande Distinction. She pursued her studies at the Eastern Musical Festival in the USA and at l’Accademia Chiggiana in Siena, Italy.
She has studied with Walter Levin (LaSalle Quartet), Rainer Schmidt (Hagen Quartet), Heime Müller and Natalia Prischepenko (Artemis Quartet), Eberhard Feltz and members of the Danel Quartet.
First violinist of the Alfama for 15 years, Elsa de Lacerda has played in many prestigious international concert halls and festivals, including Bozar, deSingel, Philharmonie Luxembourg, the Festival d’Ambronay, la Cité de la Musique, la Philharmonie de Paris, Flagey, the Musée d’Orsay, the Stavelot Festival, Flaneries Musicales de Reims, Festival Artonov, the Bordeaux Opera, the Dijon Opera, the Alcobaça, Espinho Festival in Portugal, the Rouen Opera and the Festival de Cran-Montana et Racinotes in Switzerland.
She has collaborated with pianists Pierre Solot, Elodie Vignon and Nathanaël Gouin, cellists Marie Hallynck and Kacper Nowak, and singers Jodie Devos and Albane Carrère.
She has recorded seven CDs under the Musica Ficta, Fuga Libera, Cyprès and Harmonia Mundi labels, which have received critical acclaim in Belgium and abroad.
Her CD Still Schubert, released by Cyprès, won the Octave de la Musique award in 2020.
Her latest CD, CHANGE, with pianist Pierre Solot, will be released in 2023 under the Cyprès label. It features 11 new compositions based on revolutionary and resistance songs and melodies.
For the past 20 years, Elsa de Lacerda has also devoted herself to another passion, that of journalism and music criticism.
As a producer and presenter with Musiq3-RTBF for 13 years, she has presented the Queen Elisabeth Competition for violin and cello several times for Belgian radio and television and produced the programme ‘Autour de Midi’, a daily programme dedicated to concert and recording news. She regularly introduces concerts at the Klara Festival and Flagey and has worked as a music critic for Le Soir, Le Vif/l’Express and the programme ‘Table d’Écoute’ on Musiq3.
Elsa de Lacerda plays a Florentine violin made by Tomaso Carcassi in 1766, generously on loan from the Michaël Guttman Collection.
— January 2023