about
Olivier Duverger Houpert is a multi-faceted musician. He trained in classical and contemporary saxophone - a repertoire he still loves and practices today - with Philippe Geiss and Lars Mlekusch (2010-2014) in Strasbourg and Vienna. He then turned to the field of free improvisation and its many ramifications. This work led him to join the Interprétation et Création Musicales doctorate program at the Collège Glarean in Strasbourg. A passionate researcher, he devotes himself to the study of compositions to be improvised, or comprovisations, and to the formation of creative ecosystems.
His improvisations and interpretations, sometimes flaying and incandescent, sometimes delicate and poetic, reflect his questioning of identity, multiple and unfathomable, finding his way in the interstices between categories, zones of complexity and rhizomic entanglements. Between virtuosity and fragility, between exaltation and intimate meditation, controlled mastery and performative trance, Olivier expresses himself on four saxophones, both acoustic and with effects pedals, objects or electronics.
Olivier is founder of the improvisation ensembles Al Zouhir/Duverger and Grch. Also a member of the RE/SONO saxophone quartet, he won the Illzach (France) and Salieri-Zinetti (Verona, Italy) International Chamber Music Competitions in 2017. He also performs with Ensemble L'Imaginaire for Sérgio Rodrigo's Cavacar project (La Pokop, 2023, Festival Musica 2024). In theater, he performs with actress Ysanis Padonou (Les Impatientes by Djaïli Amadou Amal, Théâtre de la Boutonnière, Paris, November 2023) and works in a research laboratory between 2021 and 2023 with the Fugue 31 company on texts by Danièle Collobert.
Olivier has performed at Kiyv as soloist with the Ukho ensemble, at the Météo (Mulhouse), Musica (Strasbourg), Jazz à Poitiers and NEW/NOW (Amsterdam) festivals, at three world saxophone congresses (Saint-Andrews 2012, Strasbourg 2015, Zagreb 2018) and in multiple cities in France or abroad. He is regularly invited to give conferences, master-classes and workshops in saxophone and improvisation (Universities and conservatories of Milan, Buenos Aires, Riga, UdK Berlin, CRD Cholet, CRC Évron...).
2021-2026 : PhD in Music Performance, Glarean College
HEAR/Académie Supérieure de Musique de Strasbourg, Strasbourg University under the supervision of Alessandro Arbo Pierre Michel, Philippe Geiss
ACCRA - Approches Contemporaines de la Création et de la Réflexion Artistique
CREAA - Centre de Recherches et d'Expérimentations de l'Acte Artistique
École Doctorale des Humanités - ED520
2014 : Master in Music Performance, HEAR/Académie Supérieure de Musique de Strasbourg, Strasbourg University
under the supervision of Pierre Michel and Philippe Geiss
2012 : Erasmus, Musik und Kunst PrivatUniversität
Lars Mlekusch saxophone class
2012 : Bachelor in Music and Diplôme National Supérieur Professionnel de Musicien (DNSPM), HEAR/Académie Supérieure de Musique de Strasbourg