Duo Noire

Focusing on contemporary music, their concerts offer “profoundly enjoyable” genre-bending repertoire with “spectacular precision” - St. Louis Post- Dispatch.

Join St. Louis Classical Guitar for the Guitar Masters Series finale with Duo Noire, a "virtuosic pair” (I Care if You Listen) of the pioneering African-American classical guitarists, Thomas Flippin and Christopher Mallett, on Saturday April 10, 7:30pm at the Ethical Society.

As well, we are so excited to welcome back these St. Louis favorites as our artists in our community education programs.

After their 2014 EP release, FIGMENTS, featuring Juilliard professor Raymond Lustig’s masterful 30-minute composition for the duo, Duo Noire gained international prominence with the 2018 release of their full-length debut album, Night Triptych, on New Focus Recordings. Named as an Editor’s Choice for top classical music albums of 2018 by both All Music and I Care if You Listen, the album featured new works exclusively written for Duo Noire by accomplished women composers: GRAMMY-nominee Clarice Assad, MacArthur Fellow Courtney Bryan, E.C.M. Artist Golfam Khayam, Mary Kouyoumdjian, Gity Razaz, and Gabriella Smith. The project was launched with a 2015 grant from the Diller-Quaile School of Music to help the duo make classical guitar concerts more gender-inclusive. The album was hailed as an "astounding...goldmine of ideas and feelings" (Stereophile), a “marvelous recital” (Limelight Magazine), “truly pathbreaking” (All Music), and “an important disc” (The Arts Fuse).

Recent highlights include giving the world premiere of GRAMMY-nominee Nathalie Joachim’s new work for Duo Noire, Held Together; filming a premiere recording at Severance Hall with members of The Cleveland Orchestra; receiving a standing ovation at the 2022 Guitar Foundation of America Convention; Flippin premiering a double concerto for Classical and Blues guitar by Chris Brubeck with the Memphis Symphony; and Mallet’s release of a landmark Naxos recording of the music of Justin Holland.

Duo Noire’s work has been featured in Acoustic Guitar Magazine, Classical Guitar Magazine, the Guitar Foundation of America's journal Soundboard, and Chamber Music Magazine.

Thomas and Christopher are graduates of the Yale School of Music. Their name is a combination of “Noir” (Black) and “La Noire” (quarter note).