In recent years, violist Antoine Tamestit has succeeded in establishing himself at the very highest level as a soloist, chamber musician and recitalist on the world's major stages. His profound and natural musicality, his incomparable technical ability and the much-acclaimed beauty of his colorful and expressive viola tone are highly regarded. Antoine Tamestit has appeared as a soloist with the world's leading orchestras, including the Gewandhaus Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, London Symphony Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, New Japan Philharmonic and Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra. Among the renowned conductors with whom he has worked are Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Valery Gergiev, Daniel Harding, Paavo Järvi, Marek Janowski, Louis Langrée, Marc Minkowski, Sir Antonio Pappano and Franz Welser-Möst. He made his debut with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra at the Lucerne Festival in 2008 under the direction of Riccardo Muti.

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Together with Frank Peter Zimmermann and Christian Poltéra, Antoine Tamestit founded the “Trio Zimmermann”. In addition to the regular tours that take the trio to the major music centers of Europe, the three musicians also dedicate themselves to the masterpieces of the literature for string trio as part of a lively recording activity. Antoine Tamestit can also be heard regularly in trio concerts with Jörg Widmann and Francesco Piemontesi. He also shares his passion for chamber music with musicians such as Leif Ove Andsnes, Nicholas Angelich, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Emmanuel Ax, Gautier and Renaud Capuçon, Leonidas Kavakos, Gidon Kremer, Emmanuel Pahud, Christian Tetzlaff, Cédric Tiberghien and string quartets such as the Quatuor Ebène and the Belcea Quartet. Following his strong affinity for singing, he also works closely with singers such as Anne Sofie von Otter, Sandrine Piau and Christianne Stotijn.

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Antoine Tamestit's wide-ranging repertoire extends from the Baroque period to the present day. The music of Johann Sebastian Bach, whose cello suites he arranged for the viola and recorded on CD, is of particular importance to him. His interest in contemporary music is reflected in numerous world premieres and recordings of new works. Jörg Widmann wrote his Viola Concerto for Antoine Tamestit. It was premiered with Paavo Järvi in Paris in 2015, with Daniel Harding conducting the subsequent premieres in Munich and Stockholm. Other works he has premiered include Bruno Mantovani's Concerto pour deux altos et orchestre, composed for him and Tabea Zimmermann, and Olga Neuwirth's viola concerto Remnants of songs ... written for him. An Amphigory, which was performed in Berlin, Tokyo, Paris and Vienna, among other places.

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In the 2017/2018 season, his musical versatility can be experienced as an artist in residence and portrait artist at the Konzerthaus Dortmund, the hr-Sinfonieorchester, the Stavanger Symfoniorkester and the Wiener Konzerthaus. As part of these artist residencies, he performs concerts with large symphony orchestras, play & conduct formats, solo recitals, educational events and chamber music concerts, including with the Quatuor Ebène, soprano Christiane Karg and pianist Malcolm Martineau.

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Antoine Tamestit performs recitals in such renowned venues as the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, the Cologne Philharmonie, London's Wigmore Hall, Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center in New York, the Stockholm Konserthuset, the Mariinsky Concert Hall in St. Petersburg and the Vienna Musikverein. He is a welcome guest on the world's major concert stages, particularly in solo recitals.

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Concert invitations have taken him to major festivals, including Aix-en-Provence, Musikfest Berlin, Edinburgh Festival, Jerusalem Festival, Lucerne Festival, New York Mostly Mozart Festival, Salzburg Festival and Verbier Festival. Since 2013, he has been Artistic Director of the Viola Space Festival in Tokyo together with Nobuko Imai. Programmatically, this unique festival is dedicated to the entire spectrum of the viola repertoire through the centuries, and the promotion of young talent, in particular the ongoing artistic mentoring of young violists, is also a key focus.

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Numerous recordings from Antoine Tamestit's discography have been awarded prizes and received high praise from the international music press. His latest recording “Bel Canto” with Cédric Tiberghien was released in February 2017 and marks the beginning of a close collaboration with the harmonia mundi label.

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Antoine Tamestit was born in Paris in 1979 and received his artistic training from Jean Sulem, Jesse Levine and Tabea Zimmermann. He attracted international attention when he won a number of major competitions in quick succession, including the Primrose International Viola Competition (Chicago, 2001) and the ARD International Music Competition in Munich. He was also a BBC New Generation Artist, laureate of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award, named “Révélation Instrumentale de l'Année” by the “Victoires de la Musique” and awarded the Deutschlandfunk Sponsorship Prize and the Crédit Suisse Young Artist Award.

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It is important to Antoine Tamestit to pass on his passion for the viola and music to future generations of musicians in masterclasses held around the world. From 2007 to 2016, he also taught as a professor, first at the Cologne Conservatory of Music and then at the Paris Conservatoire. He plays a viola by Antonio Stradivari from 1672, which is made available to him by the Stradivari Foundation Habisreutinger-Huggler-Coray.