Cameron Crozman et le génie des Lumières

Nicolas Ellis is Music Director of the Orchestre National de Bretagne, Principal Guest Conductor of Les Violons du Roy and Artistic Director of Orchestre de l’Agora, which he founded in Montreal in 2013.

The 25/26 season sees Nicolas Ellis debut with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Swedish Chamber Orchestra, Hamburger Symphoniker, the Orchestra of the Opéra National de Lorraine and the Baltimore and Seattle Symphony Orchestras; he returns for subscription concerts with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. 

Highlights of the previous season include performances with the Tampere and Luxembourg Philharmonics, San Diego Symphony, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and with the Orchestre Métropolitain, with whom he is a regular favourite.  

Now in his second season as Music Director of the Orchestre National de Bretagne, he directs Mozart, Brahms, Schumann, Stravinsky, Bartok and Shostakovich, a programme centered around Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, collaborating with a local Youth Theatre, and an evening of folk music, featuring traditional folk musicians from Québec.

Acclaimed for his approach to the baroque and classical repertoire, his recent performance of Mozart Symphony No. 25 with Les Violons du Roy was described by Le Devoir as “one of the most beautiful Mozart symphonies heard in Montreal in the last 20 years”.

At the Opéra de Montréal, Nicolas has led productions of Le nozze di Figaro, The Turn of the Screw, L'incoronazione di Poppea and L’enfant et les sortilèges. Elsewhere, he conducted Die Fledermaus at Opéra de Québec, Britten’s War Requiem at Graz Opera, and a new production of Die Zauberföte at Opéra de Rennes.

“With a rich imagination and a keen mind” (Diapason Magazine), Canadian cellist Cameron Crozman leads an active performing career as a soloist and chamber musician in Canada, the USA, and Europe. He has appeared as a soloist with the Orchestre National d'Ile-de-France (Paris), Montreal, Winnipeg, Hamilton, and Vancouver Island Symphonies among others, and performances have taken him everywhere from the Philharmonie de Paris and the Shanghai Oriental Arts Centre, to the Qidi Vidi Brewery of St. John’s, Newfoundland. An avid collaborator and chamber musician, Cameron Crozman shares the stage with eminent artists such as James Ehnes, Augustin Hadelich, Louis Lortie, Gérard Caussé, James Campbell, and members of the Ébène, New Zealand, and Penderecki String Quartets.

Winner of the 2021 Canada Council for the Arts Virginia Parker Prize, the Council’s largest award for emerging classical musicians, Cameron Crozman was CBC/Radio-Canada’s 2019 Classical Revelation artist and a laureate of Gautier Capuçon’s Classe d’Excellence at the Louis Vuitton Foundation in Paris.

Cameron’s debut album, Cavatine, recorded on the ca. 1696 “Bonjour” Stradivarius cello with pianist Philip Chiu, was released in 2019 and described by the French publication Classica Magazine as displaying “technical perfection with a personal style that leaves us wanting to hear more.” He has since recorded a number of CDs for the labels ATMA Classique in Canada and Printemps des Arts de Monte-Carlo in Monaco.

His most recent release from May 2024 of the Haydn Cello Concertos and Jacques Hétu’s Rondo performed with Les Violons du Roy and conductor Nicolas Ellis has garnered international praise. Cameron’s performances are broadcast on CBC, BBC, RTÉ Radio, Radio France, and Medici.tv.

Deeply committed to the music of today, Cameron Crozman is active in leading projects commissioning and premiering new music by some of Canada’s most recognized composers including Alexina Louie, Allan Gordon Bell, Liam Ritz, James O’Callaghan, and Kelly-Marie Murphy.

After studies in Canada with Paul Pulford, Cameron was a student at the Paris Conservatoire and received his Prix de violoncelle with highest honours studying in the class of Michel Strauss and chamber music with Claire Désert and Ami Flammer. In 2018, he received a one year mentorship with violinist James Ehnes as part of the André-Bourbeau award from the Jeunesses Musicales Canada.

Passionate about teaching the next generation, he has been invited to give masterclasses at the Académie Rainier III in Monaco, Lawrence University (Wisconsin), University of Montreal, Conservatorio Superior de Música Joaquín Rodrigo Valencia, and the Escola Superior de Music de Lisboa, among others.

Cameron Crozman is the co-founder of ClassicalValley, a festival bringing together chamber music and wine in Okanagan Valley of British Columbia, Canada, and the artistic director of chamber music for the Edeta Arts International Festival in Llíria, Spain, designated a Creative City of Music by the UNESCO. Along with pianist Meagan Milatz, he produces a series of chamber music concerts in Montreal called “HausMusique” in one of North America’s landmark Art Deco spaces, the Grande Salle of 9th floor of the Eaton Centre. He currently plays on a c. 1750 Gennaro Gagliano cello, generously on loan from the Canada Council for the Arts Instrument Bank.