This study day brought together scholars and performers to examine the rich history of collaborative piano performance in France across 150 years. Hosted by Bangor University in conjunction with the Wales International Piano Festival and the RMA French Music Study Group, the programme combined historical musicology, analysis, archival research, performance studies, and live music-making. Together, the sessions illuminated the creative agency and artistic significance of collaborative pianists, foregrounding the pianist’s role as co-interpreter, partner, pedagogue, and cultural mediator.

The morning session commenced with a paper delivered by Lina Zikra (École Pratique des Hautes Études), in which she examined L’apport pédagogique de Marguerite Long dans la musique de chambre, highlighting Long’s central contributions to chamber-music pedagogy and performance. Drawing on archival materials preserved at the Bibliothèque La Grange-Fleuret, the paper detailed Long’s involvement with chamber ensembles, her performance partnerships, and the way her private schools advanced ensemble training in Paris throughout the early twentieth century.

Continuing the focus on pianist-collaborators of this era, Damien Top (Centre International Albert-Roussel) presented Blanche Selva au cœur du processus compositionnel, demonstrating how Selva influenced compositional processes through interpretative guidance, fingering suggestions, and editorial involvement. The paper illustrated Selva’s role not only as performer but also as trusted artistic advisor to composers such as Isaac Albéniz, Déodat de Séverac, and Pierre de Bréville.

After lunch, the study day featured a lecture-recital given by cellist Tabitha Selley and pianist Cheryl Tan (Southampton University). Titled The Cello Sonatas of Marie Jaëll, Mélanie Bonis, and Marcelle Soulange: Collaborative Practices, Gender, and Large-Scale Form, the duo explored how shifting cultural expectations and organological developments shaped chamber-music writing by women composer-pianists. Analytical commentary illuminated the textural interplay between cello and piano, and the role of collaboration in navigating gendered musical constraints in the French conservatoire tradition.

Following a short break, the afternoon session engaged with musical play and dramatic meaning in twentieth-century repertoire. Marinu Leccia (CNSMD-Lyon) presented Play, collaboration, and conflict in Milhaud’s and Poulenc’s piano writing, interpreting two-piano and four-hand works through the lens of ludic studies. This framework emphasised how musical interaction can embody collaboration, competition, humour, and social negotiation.

Kerry Bunkhall (Cardiff University) then examined The Dramatic Role of the Piano in Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites, focusing on the piano as a symbolic agent of predestination and spiritual meaning. The paper argued that the piano’s sparing but strategic presence aligns with theological themes central to the opera.

The study day concluded with a keynote address by Barbara Kelly (University of Leeds): Jane Bathori’s musical networks: collaborative performance at the Vieux-Colombier. The keynote traced Bathori’s influential curatorial and performance activities, particularly her collaborations with women pianists, and assessed their impact on the development of French mélodie and interwar musical culture.

Overall, the study day offered a nuanced and compelling account of collaborative piano as a vital and evolving artistic practice in France.

Iwan Llewelyn-Jones is the Artistic Director of the Wales International Piano Festival and Senior Lecturer in Music Performance at Bangor University.