He is a trumpeter, cornet player and teacher born in
Ales in the Cevennes region of France.He grew up in a mining family where his father was an
amateur musician and when he was still young he was taught to play the
trumpet by a friend of his father's.Although he was working in a mine at this time, his teacher urged
that he joined the Paris Conservatory and in order to gain free entry he
became part of a military band and entered when he was 18.He did not always have an easy time
at the conservatory though and even though he won a prize for the cornet
after only six months there, his professor beat him and said he should go
back when he could "excel in his playing".This he did a few weeks later when he perfected his
performance of Arban's etudes and he would later go on to win trumpet competitions
such as the Geneva International Competition and the Internationalen
Wettbewerb held at Munich.After entering his career as a professional trumpeter, often on the
piccolo trumpet, he could be heard on many recordings of Baroque music and
after wanting to move outside the realms of trumpet composition, he became
acclaimed for his transcription of Baroque works written for stringed instruments
as well as flute, oboe and voice. Influencing artists such as Wynton Marsalis his
work can be heard on over 300 recordings including his won Le Plus Beaux
Noels, The Trumpet Shall Sound, Concertos pour Trompette, Musique a
Notre-Dame, Concert Baroque and The Ultimate Trumpet Collection
and with other artists on Claude Bolling's Greatest Hits, Big Band
and Toot Suite.Nowadays
he can often be heard performing in a trio with his children who are
Beatrice on the oboe and Nicolas on the trumpet.As a teacher he has been Professor of Trumpet at the
Paris Conservatory since 1967, the City of Paris created the International Trumpet
Competition, aka Maurice Andre Competition, in his honour, and he has
designed a four-valve piccolo trumpet which is now player by top
trumpeters.
