Homard Duo features two brilliant musicians originally from southeastern New Brunswick: flutist Phoebe Robertson and pianist Pierre-André Doucet. Their group is named in homage to the humble lobster, an emblem of Atlantic Canada, but also to a Middle English term for returning home. Collaborators since 2020, Phoebe and Pierre-André delight in bringing repertoire for flute and piano to audiences of all ages and backgrounds. Their previous collaborations have taken a variety of formats ranging from lecture-recital demonstrations to a performance in the Été musical de Barachois. Each now based in their own region of North America, Phoebe and Pierre-André remain united by their enthusiasm for performing and collaborating with one another.

Hailed as “exquisite” by the WASBE Journal, Canadian flutist Phoebe Robertson is Assistant Professor of Music at Arkansas Tech University. Her solo and orchestral performances have brought her to such venues as Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw and Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie as well as halls from coast to coast in North America. She has performed as soloist with ensembles including the National Arts Centre Orchestra, the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic, and Symphony New Brunswick. Recipient of the Grand Prize of the National Arts Centre Orchestra Bursary Competition in 2015, she has since performed in competitions and festivals across North America and Europe, earning the Harry G. Archer Award, the title of Major Artist of the Pittsburgh Concert Society, third place in the Flute Society of Washington Young Artist Competition in the American national capital, and top prizes in the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic Soloist Competition and the Silberman Chamber Music Competition. Her playing has been featured on BBC Radio 3 and in records on the Linn and NYOC labels.

Her performances as an orchestral flutist have brought her to halls throughout Europe and North America, including a broadcasted performance with the Orchestra of the Americas at the 2018 Edinburgh International Festival. She frequently appears alongside members of the New York Philharmonic and Metropolitan Opera Orchestra as a fellow of APEX Ensemble, conducted by the Met’s concertmaster, David Chan. She has also performed with the National Arts Centre Orchestra, Ottawa Symphony Orchestra, and Saskatoon Symphony Orchestra, among other ensembles. Equally passionate about performing, teaching, and research, her academic focus is on the flute music of Sofia Gubaidulina and the philosophical concept of opposition. She has presented her work throughout North America and Europe, with several publications forthcoming. Her research on sexuality in Greek myths as depicted in music by Debussy and Ravel has also been published in the Eidolon Journal of Classics. She is frequently engaged to write program notes for the North Shore Symphony Orchestra and other ensembles throughout the United States and Canada, and has been praised for her ability to write about music in a way that makes concerts more accessible to audiences with a wide variety of backgrounds. She serves on the editorial board of CAML Review, the official publication of the Canadian Association of Music Libraries, Archives, and Documentation Centres, and strives to stay deeply connected to her Canadian roots while living and working in the United States.

Raised in Sackville, New Brunswick, Canada, Phoebe earned her Doctorate of Musical Arts at the Manhattan School of Music in New York, studying with Linda Chesis and Robert Langevin. She holds a Master of Music degree from Carnegie Mellon University, where she studied with Lorna McGhee, and a Bachelor of Music degree from her studies with Camille Churchfield at the University of Ottawa. Her studies and professional activities have been generously supported by the Sylva Gelber Music Foundation, the O’Brien Foundation, and the Friends of the National Arts Centre Orchestra. www.phoeberobertsonflute.com.

Pianist, writer, and cultural worker Pierre-André Doucet is a leading voice among Canada’s newest generation of artists.He has performed in every Canadian province, as well as extensively throughout Europe, New Zealand, South Africa and the United States. From 2016-2020, he was one of the first chamber musicians hired to the Lincoln Center Stage roster, a collaboration between the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts and Holland America Line which saw him perform on cruise ships worldwide. He has been heard on NPR, Radio-Canada and CBC, and has toured under the auspices of both Debut Atlantic and Prairie Debut, among others. Winner of the prestigious Knigge Piano Competition, as well as the Eckhardt-Gramatté Competition alongside soprano Alexandra Smither, he has also been a laureate of the Women’s Musical Club of Toronto Career Development Award Competition, the Ibiza International Piano Competition and the Prix d’Europe. His ardent work in disseminating new music has also led him to premiere works by William Bolcom, Mark Carlson, Richard Gibson, Libby Larsen, Nicole Lizée, Jocelyn Morlock, and Alan L. Smith, among others.

Mr. Doucet has been a guest professor at l’Université de Montréal, where he completed doctoral studies under the tutelage of Maneli Pirzadeh. He also holds a Graduate Diploma in Performance in collaborative piano from McGill University. Previously, he also attended masterclasses at Tanglewood Music Center, Music Academy of the West, the Franz-Schubert Institut, and Toronto Summer Music, and as recipient of a Stern Fellowship at Songfest. Through these experiences, he has benefited from masterclasses with such luminaries as Sir Thomas Allen, Elly Ameling, Helmut Deutsch, Julius Drake, Margo Garrett, Marilyn Horne, Graham Johnson, Warren Jones, Kiri Te Kanawa, Martin Katz, Christa Ludwig, Sanford Sylvan, Dawn Upshaw, Roger Vignoles and Howard Watkins. He has received financial support from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (Joseph-Armand Bombardier Graduate Scholarship), the Fonds québécois de recherche en société et culture, the Canadian Art Song Foundation, the Canada Council for the Arts, Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec and the New Brunswick Arts Board.

Pierre-André Doucet is the prize-winning author of Sorta comme si on était déjà là (2012) and Des dick pics sous les étoiles (2020), both published at Prise de parole. He is a three-time finalist of the literary competition at the Jeux de la Francophonie (Beyrouth 2009, Nice 2013 and Kinshasa 2023), and his works have also appeared in Ancrages, Art Song Canada Magazine, Impossible Archetypes and Voix plurielles. In 2023, he was the artistic director for Une maison traversée, an event celebrating his publishing house’s 50th anniversary at Montréal’s Festival international de littérature. He has been co-Director of Barachois Summer Music since 2012, and was also the Interim Executive Director of the Frye Festival, Atlantic Canada’s largest literary event, from 2021-2022. Since last summer, he has been the coordinator of the McGill-UdeM Piano-Vocal Arts Residency, of which he was part of the first graduating class.