Frédéric Chatoux was born in Marseille in 1965. He began studying the flute at age 7, with teachers from the School of Joseph Rampal: Yves Vivet in Manosque, Jean Patero in Marseille, Jean-Loup Grégoire at the Conservatoire régional de Paris, and Alain Marion at the Conservatoire national supérieur de musique de Paris, from which he graduated in 1988 with a first prize in flute and a second, unanimous first prize in chamber music.

Then, he completed his studies with Aurèle Nicolet, and began his professional career as principal flute at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival Orchestra conducted by Leonard Bernstein.

Hired at the Paris National Opera Orchestra in 1992, he was promoted in 2000 to the position of principal solo flute, playing under the batons of some of the world’s greatest conductors: Valery Gergiev, Pierre Boulez, Neeme Järvi, Seïji Ozawa, Thomas Hengelbrock, Philippe Jordan, Gustavo Dudamel, and others.

Today a flute teacher at the regional conservatoires of Paris and Boulogne-Billancourt, Frédéric Chatoux pursued a career as a soloist and chamber musician for many years, performing with the Vienna Chamber Orchestra (Austria), the Macedonian Philharmonic Orchestra (North Macedonia), the Taipei Symphony Orchestra (Taiwan), the Symphony of the Garde Républicaine and the National Cannes Orchestra, and with chamber music partners Lutxi Nesprias, Yvan Cassar, Emmanuel Ceysson, Bertrand Giraud, Emmanuel Rossfelder, Laurent Verney, the Pelléas trio, the Paris Flute Quartet, and others.

Frédéric Chatoux directs a collection at the music publishing house Éditions Gérard Billaudot, and works constantly at increasing the flute repertoire.