Guillaume Pirard is a Belgian conductor and violinist whose musical life has been shaped by a wide-ranging experience of orchestral playing, chamber music, and collaboration with living composers. He is currently Music Director of the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra in Ithaca, New York. His conducting engagements include the Royal Chamber Orchestra of Wallonia, Cape Symphony, Ensemble X, Cornell Symphony Orchestra, Orlando Philharmonic, Lviv Philharmonic, Mannes Orchestra, and NYU Philharmonia, among others. He has also served as Assistant Conductor of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra under JoAnn Falletta.

Pirard is active in the performance and creation of contemporary music through collaborations with composers such as Seare Farhat, Lembit Beecher, Laura Cetilia, and Christina Courtin. In 2024, he launched the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra Composer Commission Project, an annual initiative supporting the creation of new orchestral works by composers with ties to the region.

A founding member and co-concertmaster of the Brooklyn-based collective The Knights, Pirard performed and toured internationally with the ensemble for over two decades, appearing in venues including the Musikverein in Vienna, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, and the Tonhalle in Zurich, as well as at festivals including Tanglewood, Ravinia, Caramoor, Skaneateles, the Festival de Pâques in Aix-en-Provence, and the Salzburg Festival. He has recorded for SONY Classical and Warner Classics and has collaborated with artists including Yo-Yo Ma, Dawn Upshaw, Vijay Iyer, and Reinbert de Leeuw. His performing career has included the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, A Far Cry, Sejong Soloists, and the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie.

His approach to music is shaped by a longstanding engagement with historical performance practice. He studied in The Hague and Brussels with Vera Beths, Mira Glodeanu, and Anner Bylsma, in repertoire from the Baroque through the Romantic. He has performed with period ensembles and in chamber music series in Europe and the United States, including the Helicon Foundation, Smithsonian Chamber Players, Chamber Music Society of Central Virginia, Staunton Festival, Les Muffatti, and the Context series at Rice University.

Born in Belgium, Pirard studied violin at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels and The Juilliard School before earning a Master's degree in Orchestral Conducting from the Mannes School of Music in New York, where he studied with David Hayes. He has served on the faculties of Cornell University, Ithaca College, and New York University.