Yann Tiersen

The early years: 1970–1992 Tiersen was born in 1970 in Brest, in the department of Finistère, part of Brittany in northwestern France, into a French family of Belgian and Norwegian origins. He started learning to play the piano at the age of four, the violin at the age of six, and received classical training at several musical academies, including those in Rennes, Nantes, and Boulogne-sur-Mer. In the early 1980s, he was influenced as a teenager by the punk subculture, and bands like The Stooges and Joy Division. When he was 13, he broke his violin, bought an electric guitar, and formed a rock band. Tiersen was living in Rennes back then, home to the three-day music festival Rencontres Trans Musicales, which is held annually in December. That gave him the opportunity to see acts like Nirvana, Einstürzende Neubauten, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, The Cramps, Television, and Suicide. A few years later, when his band parted, Tiersen bought a cheap mixing desk, an 8-track reel-to-reel tape recorder, and started recording music on his own with a synthesiser, a sampler, and a drum machine. The 17-track-album was inspired by and written for the theatrical adaptations of Tod Browning's 1932 cult classic Freaks, and Yukio Mishima's 1955 version of Noh play The Damask Drum. In April 1996, one year later, he released Rue des cascades, a collection of short pieces recorded with a toy piano, a harpsichord, a violin, a piano accordion, and a mandolin. The title track, sung by French solo singer Claire Pichet, was used the following year for the Palme d'Or nominated French drama film The Dreamlife of Angels, and several tracks received greater exposure when they were featured on the Jean-Pierre Jeunet's film Amélie, five years later. Tiersen rose to domestic fame upon the release of his third studio album, Le Phare (The Lighthouse) in 1998. The album was recorded in self-imposed seclusion on the isle of Ushant (, ) at the end of the English Channel which marks the most north-western point of territorial France. Tiersen spent two months there, living in a rented house. At night-time, he would watch the Phare du Creach, one of the most powerful lighthouses in the world, and was fascinated by the stunning scenery repeated every night. Le Phare, which featured Claire Pichet, French singer and songwriter Dominique A, and Belgian drummer and percussionist Sacha Toorop, sold over 160,000 copies, confirming Tiersen's status as one of the most innovative artists of his generation and commencing a run of successful albums. André Téchiné's Alice et Martin (1998) and Christine Carrière's Qui plume la lune? (1999). Tiersen also recorded Bästard ~ Yann Tiersen, a three-track-extended-play released in 1998 in collaboration with French electronic rock band Bästard, and his first live album, Black Session: Yann Tiersen. The live album was recorded on 2 December 1998 as he played the opening act of the Rencontres Trans Musicales in the Salle Serreau at the Théâtre National de Bretagne in Rennes, for the ''C'est Lenoir'' French broadcast show on the public radio station France Inter. The album features the chamber pop group The Divine Comedy fronted by Northern Irish singer and songwriter Neil Hannon, the French rock band Noir Désir with singer and songwriter Bertrand Cantat, singer and illustrator Françoiz Breut, French rock band The Married Monk (Christian Quermalet, Philippe Lebruman, Etienne Jaumet, Nicolas Courret), French folk rock group Les Têtes Raides (Christian Olivier, Grègoire Simon, Pascal Olivier, Anne-Gaëlle Bisquay, Serge Bégout, Jean-Luc Millot, and Edith Bégou), the string quartet Quatuor à cordes, guitarist and composer Olivier Mellano, and author Mathieu Boogaerts, as well as his usual collaborators and friends, Claire Pichet and Dominique A. The album was recorded by France International, mastered by Radio France, and released in CD format one year later on 2 November 1999. In 1999, Tiersen together with The Married Monk, Claire Pichet, and Olivier Mellano released his first collaboration album, Tout est calme. The 26 minutes, 10 tracks mini album peaked at number 45 on the French Albums Chart. Amélie received great critical acclaim and was a box-office success. The film went on to win the Best Film award at the European Film Awards, four César Awards, including Best Film and Best Director, two BAFTA Awards, including Best Original Screenplay, and was nominated for five Academy Awards. The soundtrack was a mixture of both new and previously released material, and Tiersen was also the recipient of the César Award for Best Music Written for a Film, and of the World Soundtrack Academy award. The soundtrack album charted in many countries, including the number one position on the French Albums Chart. While he was writing the film score for Amélie, Tiersen was also preparing his fifth studio album ''L'Absente. The album, which was released on 5 June 2001 through EMI France, was preceded by two promotional singles for "A quai" and "Bagatelle" respectively. Tiersen provided strings and vibraphone to two tracks, "Roma Amor" and "Holidays", featured on R/O/C/K/Y'', the third studio album by The Married Monk. At this time he was married to Belgian actress Natacha Régnier, co-star of The Dreamlife of Angels. Régnier became a singer and Tiersen wrote three songs for her including his arrangement of Georges Brassens' "Le Parapluie", a song featured on the tribute album Les Oiseaux de passage, released in 2001. That same year they toured in France and abroad. They have a daughter, Lise, born in 2002, but Tiersen and Régnier have since divorced. In this period, Tiersen also took his music out around the world, playing shows with a full orchestra and an amplified string quartet. Tiersen's skills as a composer of film scores were much in demand, and the soundtrack for Amélie was soon followed by the film score for Good Bye, Lenin!, a 2003 German Tragicomedy film directed by Wolfgang Becker. Tiersen was the recipient of the German Film Awards for Outstanding Music. On 15 November 2003, Tiersen with Stuart A. Staples, the lead singer of indie band Tindersticks, actress and singer Jane Birkin, singer and songwriter Christophe Miossec, and Dominique A released 3 titres inédits au profit de la FIDH (3 New Tracks for the Benefit of FIDH), a three-track CD that was part of the On Aime, On Aide benefit collection for raising funds for the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH). (right) at Cabaret Vauban, Brest, France, 6 February 2005. Tiersen's list of collaborators continued to grow album after album and in October 2004 he released Yann Tiersen & Shannon Wright, a collaboration album with American singer-songwriter Shannon Wright, and, in the same year, he is featured on The Divine Comedy's album Absent Friends. In 2005, Tiersen released his fifth studio album Les Retrouvailles. The album features several collaborators including the Orchestre National de Paris, singers Elizabeth Fraser, Jane Birkin, Stuart A. Staples, Dominique A, and Miossec, strings players Jean-François Assy, Frederic Dessus, Guillaume Fontanarosa, Bertrand Causse, Anne Causse Biragnet, Armelle Legoff, Frédéric Haffner, flute player Elliott, drummer Ludovic Morillon, and ondes Martenot player Christine Ott. Les Retrouvailles also includes a DVD short film entitled La Traversée, directed by Aurélie du Boys, which documents the making of the album in Ushant, and incorporates an animated video for the non-album track "Le Train" and live versions of a handful of songs. The album produced a single, "Kala", sung by Elizabeth Fraser, and Tiersen also played piano on Staples' solo debut album, Lucky Dog Recordings 03-04. The subsequent world tour of 2006 replaced the multi-instrumental ensemble with electric guitars and an ondes Martenot, and produced his third live album, On Tour, which was released together with a DVD, directed by Aurélie du Boys, about the tour, in November 2006. In 2006, he also released two singles, "La Mancha" and "La Rade", and he was featured on The Endless Rise of the Sun, the third studio album by electronic group Smooth, Raides à la ville extended play by Katel, and 13m2 by David Delabrosse. After a five-year absence as a composer of film scores, Tiersen provided the background music for Tabarly, a 2008 documentary film by Pierre Marcel about the French sailor, two-time champion of the Single-Handed Trans-Atlantic Race, and father of French yachting Éric Tabarly. The documentary was released in June 2008, exactly ten years after Tabarly's death. Éric Tabarly was lost on the night of 12–13 June 1998 in the Irish Sea when he was struck by a gaff of his Pen Duick during heavy swell and knocked overboard from his yacht near Wales while on his way to the Fife Regatta in Scotland. His body was recovered five weeks later off the coast of Ireland by a French fishing trawler. The documentary, narrated by Tabarly himself, traces his sporting career until his last meal in Ushant. The album was released by Mute Records in Europe and ANTI- Records in the US. The record was promoted in a tour beginning in October 2010, starting in New York City. Dust Lane was preceded by the release of the vinyl EP PALESTINE and by the single for "Ashes". In 2010, Tiersen also contributed to the tribute album to cross-genre, experimental music group Coil The Dark Age of Love by This Immortal Coil, a one-off tribute formation, and to Li(f)e, the fourth solo studio album by hip-hop artist Sage Francis. October 2011 saw the European release of his seventh studio album, Skyline. The nine-track album, a follow on from his Dust Lane, was once again recorded at Tiersen's home on the island of Ushant in the south-western end of the English Channel, with further parts recorded in Paris, San Francisco, Berlin, and Nashville. It was subsequently mixed by producer Ken Thomas in Leeds, and mastered by Ray Staff in London. The album produced the singles for "Monuments" and "I'm Gonna Live Anyhow". On 18 February 2012, Tiersen with Lionel Laquerriere, and Thomas Poli, presented his side project, Elektronische Staubband, at La Route du Rock music festival in Saint-Malo. It was about an hour of krautrock, electronic, and experimental music involving a dozen of synthesizers and analog keyboards with the first three pieces of the set list taken from Dust Lane and the remaining five from Skyline. Tiersen was also chosen by Jeff Mangum of Neutral Milk Hotel to perform at the All Tomorrow's Parties festival in March 2012 in Minehead, England. Skyline was released in North America via ANTI- Records on 17 April 2012, and it was followed by the Skyline Tour with dates in the United States, Canada, Iceland, Spain, Portugal, France, Slovak Republic, Austria, Finland and the United Kingdom. On 3 August 2016, it was announced that Tiersen married Emilie Quinquis in Ushant, Brittany. Quinquis stated that she and Tiersen were married on 31 July 2016. On 6 April 2017 the couple had a son. ==Music==

Styles and instruments Tiersen's music is influenced by the classical training he received as a child, by American and British punk subculture, and by the music he used to listen to as a teenager. His musical style is deceptively easy to recognize but difficult to define. It varies greatly from one album to another and with time. His melancholic music and composing techniques mix classical and folk music elements with pop and rock ones. His delicate but deeply emotional style has been linked to Frédéric Chopin and the other great masters of Romantic music, and also to Erik Satie, the colourful figure of the early 20th century Parisian avant-garde whose work was a precursor to later artistic movements such as minimalism, repetitive music, and the Theatre of the Absurd. Tiersen is also compared to one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century, the American minimalism, classical–contemporary classical, and ambient music composer Philip Glass, and to British minimalist music composer, pianist, librettist and musicologist Michael Nyman, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy career and who is the reason for Tiersen to be often called the Gallic Michael Nyman. and his 2005 album, Les Retrouvailles, features vocals from Stuart Staples of Tindersticks, English actress and singer Jane Birkin, Breton singer and songwriter Miossec, Elizabeth Fraser, the vocalist for the pioneer alternative rock group Cocteau Twins, and the Orchestre National de Paris. Vingt à Trente Mille Jours by Françoiz Breut, Lucky Dog Recordings 03-04 by Stuart A. Staples, and Li(f)e by Sage Francis, as well as records by Noir Désir, Têtes Raides, The Married Monk, French electronic trio Smooth, Katel, David Delabrosse, Christine Ott, or Miossec. In 2011, Tiersen, with Lionel Laquerriere and Thomas Poli, has also started Elektronische Staubband, a side project on electronic music. This new project is expected to lead to the release of a new album in 2013. Charity work In 2011, Tiersen collaborated with the Yellow Bird Project (YBP) to design a t-shirt, which was sold to raise money for Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). The main reason he chose to support MSF, is for their work as one of the three charities helping refugees in Libya at the time. A live video session was also filmed in the MSF London offices to promote the T-shirt and raise awareness for the cause. ==Discography==

Studio albums Soundtracks Live albums Singles and EPs Charting Others • Rue des cascades (7" vinyl EP) (1996) • Black Session (EP promo) (1998) • "La vie rêvée des anges" (CD single) (1998) • "Les grandes marées" (1999) • "Comptine d'un autre été : L'après-midi" (2001) • "À quai" (CD single promo) (2001) • "Bagatelle" (CD maxi promo) (2001) • 3 titres inédits au profit de la FIDH (part of the On Aime, On Aide collection, composed to raise funds for the FIDH, sold exclusively at Fnac) (2003) • "Kala" (2005) • "La mancha" (2006) • "La rade" (2006) • Palestine (vinyl EP) (2010) • "Ashes" (2010) • "Monuments" (2011) • "I'm Gonna Live Anyhow" (2011) Collaborations Contributions • One Trip/One Noise (by Noir Désir) (1998) • "À ton étoile" (arrangements, strings, vibraphone, bell, mandolin, electric guitar and bass) • "Gin Soaked Boy" (by The Divine Comedy) (1999) • Vingt à Trente Mille Jours (by Françoiz Breut) (2000) • "Porsmouth" (vibraphone), "Vingt à trente mille jours" (vibraphone), "L'heure bleue" (violin), "Le verre pilé" (vibraphone); arrangements • Gratte-poil (by Têtes Raides) (2000) • "Cabaret des nues" (violin) • R/O/C/K/Y (by The Married Monk) (2001) • "Roma Amor" (strings, vibraphone), "Holidays" (strings), and "Cyro's Request" (vibraphone) • Les oiseaux de passage (tribute to Georges Brassens) (2001) • cover of "Le parapluie" with Natacha Régnier • Absent Friends (by The Divine Comedy) (2004) • "Sticks & Stones" (accordion); "Anthem for Bored Youth" (accordion), a track appearing only on the French limited edition • The Belgian Kick (by The Married Monk) (2004) • viola on "Love Commander" and "Totally Confused" • Lucky Dog Recordings 03-04 (by Stuart A. Staples) (2005) • "She Don't Have to Be Good to Me" (piano) • The Endless Rise of the Sun (by Smooth) (2006) • "The Endless Rise of the Sun" (keyboards) • Raides à la ville (by Katel) (2006) • "La Vielle" (violin) • 13m2 (by David Delabrosse) (2006) • production and arrangements • Solitude Nomade (by Christine Ott) (2009) • "Pensées sauvages" (violin) • Finistériens (by Miossec) (2009) • music and arrangements • Li(f)e (by Sage Francis) (2010) • production and arrangements on "The Best of Times" • ''Soyons désinvoltes, n'ayons l'air de rien'' (2×CD+DVD Deluxe edition) (by Noir Désir) (2011) • "À ton étoile (Yann Tiersen Mix)" (arrangements, strings, vibraphone, carillon, mandolin, bass, and electric guitar) DVDs ==Notes==