Winner of first prize at the Finale Ligure International Competition, Éric Picard was appointed Principal Cellist of the Orchestre de Paris at the age of 23.

Alongside his work with the Orchestre de Paris, he held the post of Principal Cellist with the World Orchestra for seven years and, with a particular affinity for the contemporary repertoire, pursued an international career as a soloist and chamber musician. The recording in which he appears as soloist for Xenakis’s N’Shima was awarded the Grand Prix de l’Académie Charles Cros.

He has performed as a soloist under the baton of conductors such as Pierre Boulez, Christoph Eschenbach, Paavo Järvi, Xu Zhong, Wolfgang Sawallish and Christoph von Dohnányi in prestigious venues including the Salle Pleyel, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Bunka Kaikan in Tokyo, the Musikhalle in Hamburg and the philharmonic halls in Shanghai and Mexico City. His chamber music partners have included the pianists Menahem Pressler, Brigitte Engerer, Yvonne Loriot, Daniel Barenboim and Vanessa Wagner, as well as the violinists Viktoria Mullova, Hae Sun Kang and Pierre Fouchenneret. In 2002, he founded the Diabolicus ensemble.

Driven by a reflection on the nature of the concert, and seeking ongoing and committed collaborations throughout the entire process of creating a programme, he works with the composers Luis Naon, Martin Matalon, Bruno Mantovani, Philippe Hersant and Marc-André Dalbavie (who wrote a piece for solo cello for him in 2008). He was the initiator and creator, alongside Pierre Boulez, of the event ‘Un certain parcours’, which was recorded for France Télévisions in 2010. He is also the initiator and creator of Quinte & Sens (a film by François-René Martin and Gordon), broadcast on Arte in 2020 and which received rave reviews from critics and the public alike.