ABBAYE DE MAUBUISSON, Grange dîmière
Life of Fanny M.writing to exist
FRIDAY, JUNE 5TH 2026 - 20:00
Marianne Denicourt, narrator
Sarah Dayan, violin
Héloïse Luzzati, cello
Célia Oneto Bensaid, piano
Pierre Créac’h, drawings
Long relegated to the role of “the sister of”, Fanny Mendelssohn remained in the shadow of her famous brother and a history of music written from a male perspective.
Through an original text by Pauline Delabroy-Allard, brought to life by the actress Marianne Denicourt, live projected drawings by Pierre Créac’h, and a selection of works performed on stage by Sarah Dayan, Héloïse Luzzati and Célia Oneto Bensaid, La vie de Fanny M. traces the life of a virtuoso musician, prolific composer and key figure in the Berlin music scene of the 19th century. Based on her diary and correspondence, and written in language accessible to younger audiences, Pauline Delabroy-Allard’s text (Ça raconte Sarah, Qui sait) gives voice to Fanny’s inner thoughts. An intimate, powerful voice, full of dreams, struggles and lucidity. The story is performed on stage by the actress Marianne Denicourt (Hippocrate, Médecin de campagne), accompanied by animated illustrations by the artist Pierre Créac’h, projected live in front of the audience to create a sensitive visual environment, somewhere between sketch and reverie.
The show is a tribute to a complete artist, but also a committed gesture: to let the audience hear, see and feel the journey of a woman who, despite the obstacles, was able to assert her voice. A feminist, sensitive and vibrant narrative that questions assigned roles, collective memory, and the place of women in the history of creativity.
PROGRAM
LA VIE DE FANNY M.
FANNY MENDELSSOHN (1805-1947)
Trio in D minor op. 11
for violin, cello and piano
Das Jahr – 12 Charakterstücke
for piano
I. März
II. Mai
III. Juni
Notturno in G minor
Schwanenlied op. 1 n°1
arr. for violin, cello and piano
Fantasia in G minor
for cello and piano
Adagio
for violin and piano
Schluss
for piano
Come and meet us after the concert to celebrate the opening with a drink!
ARTISTS
MARIANNE DENICOURT
The daughter of Bernard Cuau, a film lecturer and journalist, and sister of Emmanuelle Cuau, Marianne Denicourt was fascinated by the circus and dance in her youth. After completing her baccalaureate, she took drama classes before being selected as one of 19 students, out of 2,000 applicants, to attend Patrice Chéreau’s school at the Théâtre des Amandiers in Nanterre. Her classmates included Vincent Perez and Valeria Bruni Tedeschi. She also starred alongside some of them in Hôtel de France, directed by Patrice Chéreau, and later in L’Amoureuse, directed by Jacques Doillon. In 1990, during a screen test, Marianne Denicourt met Arnaud Desplechin, a young, as yet unknown filmmaker, and confided in him. In 1991, she starred alongside him in La Vie des morts. She worked with the director again on La Sentinelle and Comment je me suis disputé… (ma vie sexuelle). With a penchant for arthouse cinema, the actress also starred twice with Jacques Rivette in La Belle Noiseuse and Haut bas fragile. In 1996, in Passage à l’acte, Marianne Denicourt played Daniel Auteuil’s assistant, who would later become his partner for a time. She worked with him again in 1999 on The Lost Son and in 2000 in Benoît Jacquot’s Sade. During this period, she also worked under the direction of Claude Lelouch and Romain Goupil.
SARAH DAYAN
Sarah Dayan completed a comprehensive musical education at the CNR in Boulogne-Billancourt, studying in particular with Agnès Reverdy, Jacques Ghestem and Hortense Cartier-Bresson. After being awarded first prizes in violin and chamber music, she joined Olivier Charlier’s class at the CNSM in Paris. In 2003, she obtained her Higher Education Diploma from the Paris Conservatoire (CNSM) in violin and chamber music, with the distinction ‘Very Good’. In 2004, she was awarded the Maurice Ravel International Academy Prize in Saint-Jean-de-Luz, as well as the Lions Club and Rotary Club Prize for chamber music. In 2001 and 2002, she undertook an Erasmus exchange programme to study with Géza Kápas at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest. She has also received guidance from Annick Roussin, Jean Mouillère, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Michaël Hentz, Xavier Gagnepain, Peter Csaba, Jean-Jacques Kantorow, Régis Pasquier and Christophe Poiget. In 2004, she founded the Quatuor Voce, with whom she has pursued an international career. She has held the Certificate of Aptitude for Teaching the Violin since 2007.
Sarah plays a violin by Stefano Scarampella (1888).
HÉLOÏSE LUZZATI
Héloïse Luzzati is the founder and director of La Cité des Compositrices. After studying at the CNSMDP, she performed with orchestras such as Les Dissonances, the Paris National Opera Orchestra and the Orchestre National de France. In 2020, she founded the video channel La Boîte à Pépites, for which she writes and directs her own documentaries on female composers. A few months later, she launched the Festival Un Temps pour Elles, followed by its digital counterpart, the La Boîte à Pépites Advent Calendar. La Boîte à Pépites became a record label in 2022, with a highly successful debut release dedicated to Charlotte Sohy. A music publishing house, La Boîte à Pépites Publishing, was established in its wake in 2023. Now internationally recognised for her expertise on female composers, Héloïse collaborates with the most prestigious cultural institutions as part of the Cité des Compositrices’ initiatives: the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the Musée d’Orsay, the Philharmonie de Paris, the Abbaye de Royaumont… A passionate chamber musician, Héloïse also pursues her career as a cellist alongside performers such as Xavier Phillips, Célia Oneto Bensaid, David Kadouch, Raphaëlle Moreau, Manon Galy, Léa Hennino and Elsa Dreisig… Recognised for her work in promoting greater equality in musical programming, Héloïse Luzzati was named one of the “100 Women of Culture” in 2022 and was awarded the title of Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters by the Ministry of Culture in 2023.
CÉLIA ONETO BENSAID
A graduate of the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique and the École Normale de Musique de Paris, Célia Oneto Bensaid has won numerous international competitions (Piano Campus, Fondation Cziffra, the Nadia and Lili Boulanger Competition, Pro Musicis, the HSBC Prize at the Aix-en-Provence Opera Festival, and others). She is a Yamaha Artist and receives support from the Banque Populaire Foundation and the Safran Foundation. She performs with the Avignon-Provence Orchestra under the baton of Debora Waldman, the Orchestre de Bretagne under the baton of Aurélien Azan Zielinski or Anna Duczmal-Mróz… In recital and chamber music, she has performed at the Philharmonie de Paris, the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Piano aux Jacobins, La Roque d’Anthéron, La Folle Journée de Nantes, Salamanca Hall (Japan), Salle Bourgie (Montréal) and Wigmore Hall in London, among others. Her discography, comprising some ten recordings and having won numerous awards, showcases her favourite repertoires. In chamber music, she has recorded alongside the Hanson Quartet (Brecords), Raphaëlle Moreau (Mirare) and Olivia Gay (Fuga Libera), and is actively involved in projects with La Boîte à Pépites (Sohy, Strohl, Leleu…) . A regular guest on France Musique’s La Tribune Des Critiques, her latest recording project, released in April 2026, is a multi-part monograph dedicated to Philip Glass for the Mirare label.
PIERRE CRÉAC’H
An author, illustrator and composer, Pierre Créac’h is a versatile artist. He combines his talents to create illustrated musical stories for young and old alike. He writes and illustrates them, but also composes and produces the soundtracks. Classical music and drawing have always been his great loves. With a passion for the human voice and fiction, he uses a variety of means to transport his audience into a narrative world filled with poetry, mystery and tenderness. Having first graduated from the Montpellier Conservatoire of Music in piano and composition, he went on to study at the highly renowned Penninghen School of Graphic Arts, which he has remained at ever since, having taught academic drawing and illustration there for fifteen years. This dual background has steered his career towards a constantly evolving interplay between sound and image.
HAVE YOU HEARD OF FANNY MENDELSSOHN?
