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Bernard began playing the piano at the age of two. When he was 14, he was awarded first place at the Bordeaux Conservatory and later graduated from the École Normale de Musique de Paris. At 19, he recorded with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London, whilst pursuing a career as a jazz musician and performing with prominent jazz artists including Wild Bill Davis, Jimmy Woode (Duke Ellington's bassist) and Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis.
From 1987 to 1991, he worked as musical director and conductor of the successful radio show L’Oreille en Coin on National Public Radio France Inter. Between 2000 and 2003, he performed with the Ray Charles Quartet on the European and Australian tours as organist and conductor, "this guy is a genius" Ray used to say concerning Bernard. He also scored many documentaries and commercials during the 1990s.
His career as a composer began with animated films, followed by collaborations with masters such as Lalo Schifrin and Ennio Morricone.
He frequently works with director Michel Gondry and has composed songs for films including Human Nature and he scored The Science of Sleep, which screened at the Sundance Film Festival and Berlin Film Festival. He was nominated for the World Soundtrack Awards in 2007 as Discovery of the Year and won the France Musique/UCMF award at the Cannes Film Festival the same year for this movie.
In 2008 he scored the music for Gondry's Be Kind Rewind, Cash by Eric Besnard, and A Pain in the Ass by Francis Veber. The same day Be Kind Rewind was shown at the Sundance Festival, Bernard performed alongside rapper/singer Mos Def and Gondry, an avid drummer.
The following year, the Cannes Film Festival invited him to represent France in the film music concert program. He also received an award for his achievement outside of his native country from the European Union of Film Music Composers (UCMF) and was appointed as sound designer for both HBO's channel and website.
He has collaborated with French actress and director Fanny Ardant on two of her films, Chimères Absentes and Cadences Obstinées starring Gérard Depardieu and worked on Academy Award-winning Hugo by Martin Scorsese. He scored the music of Love Punch by Joel Hopkins starring Pierce Brosnan and Emma Thompson, Love at First Child by Anne Giafferi and Money by Georgian director Gela Babluani. Bernard has conducted master classes at the Cannes Film Festival as well as in Montreal, Angers, La Rochelle, Kraków, Cologne and in Aubagne, where he performed a live version of Jazz For Dogs, an album co-created with Kimiko Ono and featuring a number of prestigious guests including Fanny Ardant, Francis Lai and Laurent Korcia.
In 2014, Bernard began teaching film music classes at the Paris Conservatory and was guest of honor with Michael Giacchino at the Audi Talent Awards in Paris with the Paris Symphonic Orchestra, at Braunschweig Festival and at Soundtrack Cologne Festival.
He scored "Terra", a contemporary dance project which premiered at the Coronet in London in March 2016 and participated as composer, arranger and performer on The Avalanches long-awaited second album "Wildflower which just got gold certified album 2018.
His most recent project is an album celebrating the legendary Lalo Schifrin entitled Jean-Michel Bernard plays Lalo Schifrin which includes 3 piano duets with the master himself. The album will be released in 2017 with concerts in Los Angeles, Paris, and Japan, at the Tokyo Blue Note Jazz Festival.
Money by Gela Babluani has been awarded at the Beuxelles film festival (best film, best director).
Bernard won the Grand Prix Sacem 2017 for best composer for screen at la Salle Pleyel in Paris.
He is a Steinway Artist since 2018.
Bernard will tour around the world in 2018 with his new piano recital "Play Piano Play" (USA, Japan Yokohama French film music Festival, Fimucité 12 in Tenerife etc.) as well as a conference at the Geidai University in Tokyo.
He played for the 2018 opening ceremony at the Directors Guild of America theater in Los Angeles a concert homage to and with Lalo Schifrin and at the Steinway Beverly Hills Gallery.
Career
He was elected to the administrative board of the Union des compositeurs de musique de film (UCMF) (Union of Film Music Composers).[1]
In May 2016, Bernard was a guest at the Kraków Film Music Festival alongside Harry Gregson-Williams.[2]
In May 2017 he performed at the Kraków Film Music Festival his piano recital "cinematic Piano", one of the highlight of the festival.
Bernard contributed as composer and arranger on The Avalanches' second studio album Wildflower on songs featuring Danny Brown, Jonathan Donahue, MF Doom, and Biz Markie. He is credited on three tracks.[3] He will tour in Japan in October 2016 invited by the French Institute for series of concerts and conferences for the Tokyo Film Festival.
