Melissa Dessaigne is a French pianist born in 1989. She started playing the piano at the age of 4. Three years later, she performed « Le petit negre » by Claude Debussy in a famous French TV show, where the pianist Abdel Raman el Basha congratulated her on her remarkable assurance and her great sense of rhythm. She began her music studies at Saint-Etienne Conservatory, where she obtained degrees in piano, music theory and chamber music. At the age of 17, she was invited by festival Piano Passion to give her first solo recital at the Roanne Theater.
Her taste for chamber music and communication led her to study accompaniment. She joined David Selig’s class in Lyon National Conservatory, and completed in 2014 a Master’s Degree in collaborative piano with honors. She followed a lot of masterclasses, for example with the Dutch pianist Rudolf Jansen, the lieder specialist German baritone Udo Reinemann, the American choir conductor Andre de Quadros…
In recent years, she works as a
collaborative pianist and vocal coach with several structures,
especially in Saint-Etienne Opera, where she takes part in several
productions, including Tosca, Werther, The Enchanted flute.
Her qualities of playing and listening, with finesse and sensitivity,
the richness of her sound palette make her a sought-after accompanist.
She regularly performs solo, chamber music and choir concerts. With the
soprano Lise Viricel, she creates a show around Mozart’s
correspondences, alternating readings and operatic arias. She’s invited
to play in a lot of festivals : recitals bassoon and piano for festival Amusikenvignes (Perpignan, France), mezzo-soprano and piano for festival Classic and Jazz in Val Thorens (French Alps), accompaniment of classical dancers for Foundation Marika Besobrasova (Italy), …
She also holds a master’s degree in Music Pedagogy, in which she completed a research work on sight-reading teaching. She teaches piano and accompaniment for students of various ages and backgrounds. Finally, she works as a choir director for the chamber choir Cantabile, a group of about thirty amateur singers with whom she produces great works of the choral repertoire (Francis Poulenc’s Gloria in 2017, Martin Palmeri’s Misatango in 2018).