Roselyne Bachelot-Narquin, Minister of Culture, has approved the appointment of Guillaume Lamas as Director General of the Orchestre national des Pays de la Loire, in agreement with Christelle Morançais, President of the Pays de la Loire Regional Council, Johanna Rolland, Mayor of Nantes, Christophe Béchu, Mayor of Angers, Philippe Grosvalet, President of the Loire-Atlantique department, Christian Gillet, President of the Maine-et-Loire department and Yves Auvinet, President of the Vendée department, and following the proposal of Antoine Chéreau, president of the orchestra.
A musician by training, Guillaume Lamas served as administrator of the Orchestre Colonne, deputy head of the Orchestre de Paris' musical formations, the general administrator of the Rouen Opera Orchestra and the director of the Normandy Regional Orchestra. Since 2017, he has held the position of General Delegate for Music Services at the Opéra de Lyon.
Guillaume Lamas organizes his project for the Orchestre national des Pays de la Loire around the notions of identity, openness and decompartmentalization, sharing and transmission. Believing that artistic awareness is an indispensable ally for the success of school and professional careers and that it contributes to the development of everyone, Guillaume Lamas will deploy new initiatives dedicated to the initiation to artistic and cultural practice.
The project of Guillaume Lamas, unanimously selected, has the ambition to rely on the two phalanges of the orchestra, Nantes and Angevine, and its formation gathered in large numbers. The articulation and coherence of the project defined around these three formations, led by Pascal Rophé, rich of 97 musicians and an amateur choir led by Valérie Fayet, will facilitate the territorial, national and international diffusion of the orchestra.
Guillaume Lamas will take up his duties on 1er December 2020 and will succeed Michel Ayroles, whose Minister of Culture welcomes the 26 years of tireless commitment to the development of the orchestra.