Alain Bernheim, born 1931 in Paris, France, lives in Montreux, Switzerland. At the age of twelve he was arrested by the Gestapo and sent to the concentration camp Drancy, at fifteen he was chosen to represent the Lycée Janson-de-Sailly at the Concours Général of philosophy. He studied at the Paris Conservatory of Music, was the first French music student to receive a Fulbright scholarship which allowed him to study further at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, won second prize together with Vladimir Ashkenazy at the international piano contest in Bucharest in 1953 and gave some 2,000 concerts until 1980. Then he stopped his musical career for health reasons and turned to Masonic research. In 1986 and 1993 he was awarded the Norman Spencer Award by the English premier Lodge of Research Quatuor Coronati Lodge N° 2076, 1997 the Certificate of Literature by the Philalethes Society (US), 2001 the Albert Gallatin Mackey Scholar Award by the Scottish Rite Research Society (Washington, D.C.) which elected him a Fellow, and 2007 was selected a member of the Society of Blue Friars.A Freemason since 1963, he belongs to the Regular Grand Loge of Belgium and to the Grand Lodge Alpina of Switzerland. He was awarded the 33° by the Supreme Council of the United States (Southern Jurisdiction), elected a Chapter Knight of the Great Priory of Belgium and is a member of the Royal Order of Scotland. He is also the first French Freemason who was elected a full member of Quatuor Coronati Lodge No. 2076 (United Grand Lodge of England) from which he demitted in 2014. The Supreme Council of France made him a Member of Honour in 2014 and awarded him the distinction of Grand Commander Honoris Causa in 2018.. He wrote Les Débuts de la Franc-Maçonnerie à Genève et en Suisse (Slatkine 1994), many entries of the Encyclopédie de la Franc-Maçonnerie (Pochotèque 2000), Réalité Maçonnique (Alpina Research Group, Lausanne 2007) and some 150 papers issued in French, English and German masonic magazines. His book Une certaine idée de la franc-maçonnerie, was published September 2008 by Dervy, Paris, and Le rite en 33 grades - De Frederick Dalcho à Charles Riandey, in September 2011 also by Dervy.