Philippe Dinkel was born in Switzerland and has completed his piano studies in Geneva (premier prix de virtuosité, class of Harry Datyner), Bloomington (Indiana University, Alfonso Montecino) and Brussels (Pascal Sigrist). Chamber music is highly important in his concert activities, notably within the Trio Musiviva (1st prize of the Colmar competition), the Quatuor Sine Nomine and various other artists and ensembles.
He holds a Master in Musicology of the Geneva University. Author of numerous articles and conferences, he has taught musicology, music history and analysis before becoming head of the Conservatoire de Musique de Genève, and from 2009 of the Haute école de musique de Genève.
He has been president of the Conference of the Swiss Music Universities and served on the board of the Association Européenne des Conservatoires and in various juries of musical competitions (Clara Haskil, Enescu, Thailand International Piano Competition, Tchaikovsky competition for young musicians).
He is the chair of the artistic committee of the Geneva Music Competition and the dean of the Music and Performing Arts department of the University of Applied Arts and Sciences of Western Switzerland (HES-SO). He also works as an expert for the European foundation MusiQue, active in the field of evaluation and accreditation in higher music education.
He is Fellow of the Royal Northern College of Music (Manchester) since December 2018.
