Ismaël Margain was born in Sarlat in 1992, where he began his musical training: piano, flute, saxophone, jazz, writing. He then entered the CNSMDP, where he worked with Nicholas Angelich, Roger Muraro and Michel Dalberto, among others, and obtained his Performer's Diploma in 2017. Since then, he has been under the guidance of Maria-João Pires.
In 2012, he won the Concours International Long-Thibaud, then was nominated in the "instrumental soloist revelation" category at the Victoires de la Musique Classique awards. Following these awards, Ismaël toured Latin America and the USA for a series of recitals and master classes, before returning to Europe to perform in Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Spain and Bulgaria.
He is a regular guest at numerous festivals (Easter and Août Musical in Deauville, Piano aux Jacobins in Toulouse, Nohant Festival Chopin, l'Esprit du Piano in Bordeaux, Lille Piano(s) Festival, Festival de Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Klavier Ruhr Festival in Germany, All about piano in London...) where he performs solo, in chamber music (with Alexandra Soumm, Renaud Capuçon, Edgar Moreau, Bertrand Chamayou, Thomas Enhco, the Hermès and Hanson quartets, Mathilde Calderini ...) and as soloist with theOrchestre philharmonique de Radio France, theOrchestre national de Lille, theOrchestre national d'Île-de-France... He is also a regular on the finest Parisian stages (Philharmonie, Salle Gaveau, Auditorium du Louvre, Salle Cortot, Théâtre des Champs-Elysée...)
Ismaël Margain is an associate artist of the Fondation Singer Polignac, winner of the Yamaha Music Foundation prize, laureate of the Académie musicale de Villecroze, and supported by the Fondation Banque Populaire. In 2010, he formed a duo with Guillaume Bellom, with whom he recorded two four-hand CDs devoted to Schubert and Mozart on the Aparté/Harmonia Mundi label. He then made 3 live recordings for the B Records label: Mendelssohn in 2015, Schubert solo in 2017, and a 2-piano recital with Guillaume Bellom in 2018. Mezzo-soprano Ambroisine Bré invites him on her album "Psyché", released in 2021. The following year, he signs with Naïve Records: his first solo studio album, a Chopin / Fauré recital, is released in February 2023. A Mozart album entitled "Fantasy" was released in autumn 2024...
He is one of the four co-founders of RecitHall, a platform for capturing and streaming concerts, launched in 2020.