Notes

Clermont Pépin 1926-2006

Isabelle Picard

Le 2 septembre 2006 est décédé le compositeur québécois Clermont Pépin, à l’âge de 80 ans.

Né en 1926 à Saint-Georges-de-Beauce, Clermont Pépin a poursuivi ses études musicales à Montréal, Philadelphie, Toronto et Paris. Ses professeurs de composition y ont été Claude Champagne, Rosario Saleso, Arnold Walter, Arthur Honegger, André Jolivet et Olivier Messiaen (cours d’analyse).

Il a été lauréat de nombreux prix, parmi lesquels trois bourses d’études de la CAPAC (SOCAN), du Prix d’Europe (1949) et du prix de composition de Radio-Luxembourg (pour Le Rite du soleil noir, 1955). Il a également été nommé officier de l’Ordre du Canada (1981) et officier de l’Ordre national du Québec. En 1970, la Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Montréal lui a décerné son prix de musique Calixa-Lavallée et sa médaille Bene Merenti de Patria pour l’ensemble de son œuvre et les services rendus à la musique au Québec.

Clermont Pépin a enseigné la composition au Conservatoire de musique de Montréal de 1955 à 1964 et a été directeur de l’établissement de 1967 à 1973. Il est revenu à l’enseignement de l’écriture et de la composition aux conservatoires de musique de Montréal et de Québec de 1978 à 1987. Parmi ses élèves, on retrouve Micheline Coulombe Saint-Marcoux, François Dompierre, André Gagnon, Jacques Hétu et André Prévost.

Clermont Pépin a été Président des Jeunesses musicales du Canada de 1967 à 1972 et président de l’Association des compositeurs, auteurs et éditeurs de musique du Canada (CAPAC, devenu SOCAN) de 1981 à 1983.

Compositeur prolifique, Clermont Pépin a écrit plus de 80 œuvres pour diverses formations musicales. Elles ont été présentées au Canada, aux États-Unis, en Europe, en Amérique du Sud et au Japon.

Piccoletta

Il est à noter que les Éditions Tryptique ont récemment fait paraître un récit autobiographique de Clermont Pépin intitulé Piccoletta. Disons d’emblée que le récit n’est pas d’une qualité comparable à la musique du compositeur. Le texte aurait pu être largement élagué et fait une trop large place à des détails secondaires. On y trouvera quand même, surtout dans la dernière partie, des informations sur le processus de composition de certaines œuvres. Même si le texte est illustré de nombreux extraits de partition, on n’entre jamais dans l’analyse détaillée et le texte est largement accessible, même aux non-spécialistes. Le meilleur moyen de faire connaissance avec Clermont Pépin demeure toutefois l’écoute de sa musique.

En concert

L’Orchestre symphonique de Québec interprétera L’Oiseau-phénix de Clermont Pépin les 4 et 5 avril 2007, 20h, au Grand Théâtre de Québec. www.osq.org – 418.643.8486

Remembering Anna Russell (1911-2006)

Joseph So

To classical music lovers of a certain age, the passing of the beloved Anna Russell marked the end of an era. For over four decades, until her official retirement in 1986, she entertained us like no other with her devastating wit and folksy charm. Born Ann Claudia Russell-Brown in 1911 in London, England, of an English father and a Canadian mother, Russell studied composition and piano at the Royal College of Music with Arthur Benjamin and Ralph Vaughan Williams and worked briefly at the BBC Educational Music Department – “a crashing bore”, according to Russell herself. Her real ambition was to be a singer, but every time she opened her mouth, people laughed. Several years ago she said to me, “I had a perfectly normal voice until one day I was hit in the face by a hockey puck – it ruined my acoustics!”

In 1939, she moved to Canada with her mother and made her radio debut in 1940, singing old music-hall songs on a CFRB program called Round the Marble Arch. She also appeared on CBC’s Jolly Miller Time, where she wrote and performed comic songs, and was co-host with Syd Brown on the variety show Syd and Anna. She also played the piano and sang for the Rosselino Opera in Toronto. Working with the instrument nature had given her – “my voice has been variously described as sounding like shattering glass or a cracked temple bell” – she developed a satirical routine on classical music, which she unveiled at the old Eaton Auditorium in Toronto in 1942. It proved so popular that she attracted the attention of Sir Ernest MacMillan, conductor of the Toronto Symphony at the time. Back in those days, the classical music world was understandably stuffy, so it was to Sir Ernest’s credit that Anna was invited to appear in the annual Christmas Box concerts throughout the 40s.

Anna Russell’s fame reached Stateside in no time and she made her debut at Carnegie recital hall in 1947. Anna once told me that the venerable diva Jennie Tourel, thinking that Anna was spoofing her with the routine “For Singers with Great Artistry but No Voice: Je n’ai pas la plume de ma tante”, tried to ban the comedienne from appearing at Carnegie, but to no avail. Anna was at the height of her popularity from the 50s to the 70s. Her Anna Russell Sings? was the top-selling classical LP for an incredible 48 weeks, topping the likes of Sir Thomas Beecham and the Philharmonia Orchestra, two recording powerhouses at the time. Her analysis of Der Ring des Nibelungen – “the only grand opera that comes in giant economy-sized package” – is an all-time favourite. When the moment came for Anna to hang up her helmet and breastplate, she did it in grand style, with a hugely popular Anna Russell First Farewell Tour that played to a sold-out Carnegie Hall.

In 1986, when she finally retired for good, she moved to Unionville, Ontario, to live in a complex for seniors located a short distance from her ancestors’ family farm. Anna had her own cosy garden apartment, on Anna Russell Way, a street named in her honour. Retirement certainly didn’t mean inactivity for Anna, who made various cameo appearances, such as the one with the Amadeus Choir and Mary Lou Fallis as late as 1998. She played the Anvil in the Anvil Chorus from Il Trovatore. Anna said, “I struck the anvil so hard, it short-circuited my hearing aid!” In June 2004, her adopted daughter, Deirdre Prussak, decided to move Anna to live with her in a seaside hamlet 200 miles north of Sydney, Australia. She settled into her new surroundings well – she particularly enjoyed the warm climate, the lovely garden and the menagerie of animals in the household. We would speak on the phone at Christmastime, and her good spirits and inimitable voice remain undiminished. To end her long life – she would have been 95 this coming December 27th – in the idyllic Australian seaside, surrounded by nature, flowers, and the knowledge that she was loved and admired by those who had had the privilege of being touched by her magic marked the completion of a charmed life.