Club musical et littéraire de Montréal

Club musical et littéraire de Montréal

Club musical et littéraire de Montréal. Founded in 1933 by the pianist and teacher Gérard Gamache (b Trois-Rivières, Que, 25 Jan 1903, d Montreal, 24 July 1995) after a public concert by his pupils and a lecture by Philippe Aubé at St-Sulpice Hall. The club's dinner-discussions, six each year at the Viger Hotel during the mid-1930s, became lecture-recitals after 1941. The meetings were held 1936-8 at Tudor Hall, 1938-41 and 1973-5 at the Windsor Hotel, and 1941-72 at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. In 1975 they returned to St-Sulpice Hall in the Bibliothèque nationale du Québec. The membership which once reached 850, numbered over 300 in 1987. Musicians who have participated in the club's meetings include the pianists Aline van Barentzen, Alfred La Liberté, Charles Reiner, and Ronald Turini, the violinists Hyman Bress, Albert Chamberland, and Arthur LeBlanc, the soprano Colette Boky, and others. Jean Vallerand gave a series of lectures 1940-2 on music history. Lecturers who talked about Canadian musicians have included Félix Desrochers ('Calixa Lavallée' in 1942), Arthur Letondal ('Guillaume Couture' 1934-5), and Gilles Potvin ('Emma Albani' in 1974). In 1990 the club was one of the oldest of its kind still active in Canada. It has published (non-commercially) most of the lectures given 1940-61.

Gérard Gamache was succeeded by violinist Pierre Bournaki.