Mónica Pustilnik

Mónica Pustilnik, originally from Buenos Aires, studied guitar and piano at the Conservatorio Nacional Superior de Música in her home city, and obtained her diploma as a guitar teacher in 1991. In 2010, she obtained a Master of Arts degree from the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in the lute class of Hopkinson Smith. She specialises in Renaissance and Baroque repertoire for lute.

She learned basso continuo on lute and harpsichord with Jesper Christensen, next with Rolf Lislevand at the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik Trossingen (Germany); choral conducting with Michel Corboz at the Conservatoire de musique de Genève; and orchestra conducting with Jordi Mora in Barcelona.

 

She has an intense activity as a soloist, chamber musician and continuo player for opera and oratorio productions. Among other ensembles, she regularly performs and records with Le Concert d’Astrée (dir. Emmanuelle Haïm), Cappella Mediterranea (dir. Leonardo García Alarcón), Les Musiciens du Louvre (dir. Marc Minkowski), Les Talens Lyriques (dir. Christophe Rousset), Concerto Vocale (dir. René Jacobs), Ensemble Elyma (dir. Gabriel Garrido), Il Seminario Musicale (dir. Gérard Lesne), Concerto Soave (dir. Jean-Marc Aymes).

 

She is assistant to the musical direction during the following productions: Cavalli’s Eliogabalo at the Opéra de Paris, Elena at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Hipermestra at the Festival Oude Muziek in Utrecht; and Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo at the Opéra de Lille, and L’incoronazione di Poppea at the Haute école de musique de Genève.

 

In 2014, she directed the performances of Cavalli’s Elena at the Angers-Nantes Opéra.

 

Since 2001, her pedagogical activity has led her to teach lute, basso continuo and chamber music at the Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya, Conservatorio “Antonio Scontrino” di Trapani (Italy), and at the Conservatoire national supérieur de musique et de danse de Paris (since 2015).

 

She has recorded numerous CDs for Harmonia Mundi, Naïve, Virgin, Arcana, Glossa, K617, among others.

 

Her solo recording, featuring works by Alessandro Piccinini (Accent, 2014) has been praised by critics. Recently, she has been working on a forthcoming solo recording dedicated to music of the Italian cinquecento.