In addition to studying composition with Olivier Messiaen at the Paris Conservatoire, François-Bernard Mâche is a graduate of the French Ecole Normale Supérieure and a qualified teacher of the humanities, with a degree in Greek archaeology and a doctorate in musicology. Along with Pierre Schaeffer, he co-founded the Groupe de Recherches Musicales (GRM). Since 1993, he has served as a professor at the Paris School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS), and since 2002 has been a member of the French Academy of Fine Arts (succeeding Iannis Xenakis).

As a composer and academic, he has been invited to attend performances and present lectures in numerous countries. He is the author of a number of music-theoretical texts, including Music, myth, and nature (Klincksieck; 1983), Entre l’observatoire et l’atelier (Kimé; 1998) and Musique au singulier (Odile Jacob; 2001), and has received many prestigious awards for his compositions, including the Paris Biennale Prize (1963) for Safous Mélè, the SACEM Enesco Prize (1964), the “Grand Prix du Disque” (1971) for the recording of Danaé, the Italia Prize (1977) for Kassandra, the Chartier and Rossini Prizes from the French Academy of Fine Arts (1984 and 1998, respectively), the National “Grand Prix” for Music (France; 1988), and the SACEM “Grand Prix” for Orchestral Music (2002). He was made a Commander of the French Order of Arts and Letters in 1990.

Over the course of his career, François-Bernard Mâche has developed an idiomatic compositional language based on the poeticism of sonic models, notably drawing upon speech and nature as sources. Applying a different approach to Messiaen, his analyses of the structures of bird songs, combined with notions derived from the field of linguistics, have served as the basis for a number of his works. Korwar (1972) for harpsichord, for example, combines the syntax of the Xhosa language and the song of the shama bird (native to Malaysia). Mâche has applied this research to pieces for voice or instruments as well as to his electroacoustic works, starting with his early pieces created at GRM: Prélude (1959) for tape or Volumes (1960) for tape and ensemble. This continued in his works where the “sonic object,” i.e., a soloist, is in dialogue with an instrumental ensemble, as in L’Estuaire du temps (1993), and more recent works such as Manuel de conversation (2007) for clarinet and electronics.

His catalogue comprises many pieces for percussion instruments from all over the world, with notable examples being Phénix (1982), Marae for six percussionists and tape (1974), Kemit for darbouka (a Middle-Eastern hand-drum, 1970), and Melanga for female singer, sampler, and slendro gamelan (2001). He also has a particular affection for the modern harpsichord, and has composed extensively for the instrument: Solstice (1975), Guntur Madu (1990), Ziggurat (1998), Braises (1995), a concerto for amplified harpsichord and orchestra, and Thémis (2009).

His vocal works are imbued with Greek prosody, e.g., Safous Mélè (1958), as are, on occasion, his orchestral works, such as La Peau du silence (1970), which comprises an instrumental transcription of a reading of a poem by Georges Séfédis. Mâche’s interest in archaic languages has given rise to the composition of works such as Uncas (1986), Maponos (1990), and Kengir (1991).

His catalogue, now comprising more than 100 pieces, also includes theatrical works such as Da capo (1976), Rituel pour les mangeurs d’ombre (1979), and Temboctou (1982).