Trained initially in martial arts and circus, in his teens he became passionate about dance, particularly hip-hop culture, while simultaneously exploring other choreographic genres.He founded his first company, Accrorap, in 1989 with Kader Attou, Eric Mezino and Chaouki Saïd, while in 1996 the company Käfig (which means "cage" in Arabic and German) was born, so named to represent, paradoxically, his "openness" and refusal to to remain bound to a single style.Merzouki works by fusing different disciplines: he combines circus, martial arts, fine arts, video and live music to his exploration of hip-hop dance.Without losing sight of the roots of the hip-hop movement, his multidisciplinary approach opens up new horizons and reveals completely new perspectives.to head of the Centre chorégraphique national de Créteil et du Val-de-Marne, he develops an artistic project with an international scope, but at the same time rooted in the territory, across all aesthetic, cultural and social boundaries. Through tours, workshops, residencies and the Kalypso Festival, Merzouki promotes and celebrates hip-hop culture, an art that in more than 30 years has become a distinctive element of the cultural heritage of French identity.

After studying at the Conservatoire Supérieur de musique in Lyon, Franck-Emmanuel Comte holds prestigious positions and is a guest at theaters d'opera (including Nantes, Lyon, and Paris Opera Studio) and works with orchestras such as the Orchestre des Pays de Savoie, Ensemble Orchestral Contemporain, Auckland University Orchestra, and Collegium Musicum Riga. Artistic director of the Concert de l'Hostel Dieu, conducting it in more than 1,500 concerts and for 20 recordings. A regular guest in European and world capitals (such as Barcelona, Rome, Brussels, Madrid, Riga, Kolkata, Chennai, Beijing, and Taiyuan) and at numerous international festivals (including Brežice, Montserrat, Girona, Foligno, Wallonia, Ambronay, and La Chaise-Dieu), Franck-Emmanuel Comte is passionate about baroque repertoire and cross- or atypical artistic projects.The Concert de l'Hostel Dieu places young international soloists, recruited from academies or at European baroque music competitions, at the center of its projects. The orchestra can benefit from the experience of its first violinist Reynier Guerrero.In each of his projects, Franck-Emmanuel Comte is committed to to share a lively and unique repertoire with audiences and young artists, reshaping the classical meaning of concerts. In this spirit, he intervenes to lectures, reading-concerts and masterclasses, develops instructional videos and new concert genres. These tools allow to Franck-Emmanuel Comte to transmit his passion to a wide audience.He is artistic director of the Musicales en Auxois festival in Burgundy and the Centre musical international J.S. Bach de Saint-Donat.