It is the Festival de Lanaudière that opens the ball for Quebec’s summer classical music program. Discussion with his artistic director Renaud Loranger.
Posted at 10:00 am
Emmanuel Bernier Special Collaboration
“The musical setting works in both slow motion and seventh gear. We haven’t quite gotten our bearings yet. There are a lot of things that don’t work exactly the way they did before the pandemic, a lot of mechanics that are a lot less fluid, but I feel like everyone is trying to pretend nothing happened.”
Still, he says he’s “very proud of what’s happening at Lanaudière this year. There are still some blockbusters in the season.
The structure of the Lanaudois Summer, which runs from July 7th to August 6th, is the same as previous years, with an opening weekend hosted by the Orchester symphonique de Montréal and a closing concert with the Metropolitan Orchestra.
PHOTO ANNIE BIGRAS SUPPLIED BY THE FESTIVAL DE LANAUDIÈRE
Rafael Payare and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra
In the first case, Rafael Payare does not conduct Mahler, as in the three previous editions, but Beethoven’s beloved Symphony No. 9 in D minor, which he performed at the Maison symphonique last June. The work has not been performed at the festival since 2007. Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra awaits us the next day, but above all the debut of the young Russian pianist Denis in Concerto No. 2 in C minor by Rachmaninoff Kojoukhine, who will also play Schubert and Liszt solo on 10 July.
“He belongs to this absolutely extraordinary generation of Russian virtuosos. He’s a boy who doesn’t look like the others, who has an exceptional technique, a sound of a thickness that makes you think of Emil Gilels. It’s not an aesthetic we hear a lot these days,” says Renaud Loranger, who worked with him as Vice President at Pentatone.
PHOTO MARCO BORGGREVE, ARCHIVE MADE AVAILABLE BY THE FESTIVAL DE LANAUDIÈRE
The young Russian pianist Denis Kojoukhine
On August 4th and 5th we return with the OSM and its conductor, first with a complete Stravinsky’s Firebird and Reinhold Glière’s Harp Concerto with the virtuoso Xavier de Maistre (also solo on August 2nd), then with Schumann’s Symphony No. 2 in C major and Wagner’s Wesendonck-Lieder with mezzo-soprano Karen Cargill, a regular at the OSM.
As for the final concert, Yannick Nézet-Séguin will be at the helm of OM in Symphony No. 6 in B minor, known as “Pathétique”, by Tchaikovsky, performed at Domaine Forget last summer, but also Chopin’s Piano Concerto No 1 in E minor with the South Korean Seong-Jin Cho, a frequent partner of the Quebec conductor.
The OM and Nézet-Séguin had the opportunity last weekend to play Strauss’ monumental Alpensymphonie and Schumann’s very sporty Concert Piece for Four Horns and Orchestra, before Respighi’s Les pins de Rome and Piano Concerto No. 3 in D- Minor by Rachmaninoff with Marc-André Hamelin.
two poles
Between the start and end of the festival, music lovers will also have the chance to hear the legendary William Christie and his burgeoning arts again, this time in Handel’s rare opera Partenope, but also the phenomenal Leonardo García Alarcón, here for the first time with his Capella Mediterranea (in addition to the Namur Chamber Choir) for no less than Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo and Vespers.
On the orchestral side, we’re also entitled to Les Violons du Roy (July 14) in a Haydn-only programme, and the National Youth Orchestra of the USA conducted by veteran Andrew Davis (July 16), who will perform Berlioz’s symphony Fantastique, then the Barber Violin Concerto with the great Gil Shaham.
As for solo concerts and small ensembles, the arrival of the great accordionist Richard Galliano (July 9th), a Brahms concerto with pianist Charles Richard-Hamelin, violinist Andrew Wan and cellist Alisa Weilerstein (July 11th), but also Notable performances by The Calder Quartet in Beethoven (July 18) and pianist Angela Hewitt in Bach (July 27).
PHOTO PROVIDED BY THE FESTIVAL DE LANAUDIÈRE
Renaud Loranger, artistic director of the Festival de Lanaudière
As Renaud Loranger summarizes, “There are two protective figures in the season: Monteverdi and Rachmaninov. We have two extreme poles: absolute hubris in Rachmaninoff; Asceticism, renunciation of L’Orfeo. Handel and Haydn fit roughly in the middle, as a counterpoint to the extremes, through humor or transcendence.
“All of this can make possible, as Fernand Lindsay hoped [fondateur du festival] to show the public ways during his lifetime, in the best case scenario, to approach the good life,” he concludes philosophically.