Clarinetist Raphaël Sévère was a prodigy, making appearances worldwide as early as age 11 and enrolling at the National Conservatory of Music and Dance in Paris when he was 14. After winning major prizes as a teen, he went on to an impressive adult career.

Sévère was born in Rennes, France, on September 15, 1994. His entire family was musical, and as a child, he studied piano, cello, and violin. Sévère added the clarinet at eight, studying at the Nantes Conservatory. He continued his piano studies, but nevertheless, he made such rapid progress on the clarinet that at 11, he could perform in China with the Macao Youth Symphony Orchestra in a concert marking Mozart's 250th birthday. The following year, he took home prizes from five international competitions, including that of the Tokyo Clarinet Society, where he won five separate prizes, including the first prize. As early as 2008, he issued an album called Récital de Musiques Française. In 2010, Sévère received the Instrumental Solo Revelation prize at the Victoires de la Musique competition in France; he was the youngest person ever to receive the award. Sévère's career choice was set in 2013 when he entered the Young Concert Artists International Auditions, making a triumphant sweep of the top prize and eight special prizes. That year, he played the world premiere of a work by Poulenc, a set of incidental music for the Jean Anouilh play Le voyageur sans bagage.

He has performed with major orchestras both in France and elsewhere, including the London Philharmonic, the Deutsches Symphonieorchester Berlin, and the Hong Kong Sinfonietta. Sévère's chamber music partners are an impressive group, including Martha Argerich, Gidon Kremer, and Boris Berezovsky; he has also performed on an ongoing basis in a piano trio with pianist Adam Laloum and cellist Victor Julien-Laferrière. Sévère made his major-label debut on Mirare in 2014 with an album of Brahms clarinet works; joined by Laloum and Julien-Laferrière, Sévère won a Diapason d'Or award in 2015 for this recording. He has continued to be associated with the Mirare label. Sévère's appearances in 2019 included a chamber concert at the prestigious Salle Cortot in Paris. He remained active during the COVID-19 pandemic, releasing the album On Tour in 2020 and an album of Mozart clarinet pieces in 2022. ~ James Manheim, Rovi