2024-2025 season of Les Violons du Roy and La Chapelle de Québec
Press release
For immediate release
2024-2025 season of Les Violons du Roy and La Chapelle de Québec
40 years of presence, 40 years of beauty
Québec City, June 6, 2024 - With this new season, Les Violons du Roy and La Chapelle de Québec celebrate 40 years of a wonderful story of heart, talent, audacity, tenacity, friendship and complicity. Four decades earlier, on October 14, 1984, Les Violons du Roy gave their first concert at Université Laval. To celebrate this anniversary, Jonathan Cohen, Music Director of Les Violons du Roy, Bernard Labadie, Founding Conductor and Music Director of La Chapelle de Québec, and Nicolas Ellis, Principal Guest Conductor, together with Laurent Patenaude, Artistic Director, have imagined a season full of gifts and anticipated returns, as well as promising first encounters that illustrate the integrity and continuity of Les Violons du Roy's mission. Mario Welsh, Chairman of the Board of Directors, Christiane Bouillé and Laurent Patenaude, Co-General and Artistic Directors, were delighted today to unveil the 2024-2025 program, which once again brings together musicians, conductors and guest soloists of the highest quality.
Return gifts
Loyal fans of Les Violons du Roy, from the earliest days as well as newcomers, will be delighted by a number of long-awaited returns and some of the chamber orchestra's classics. First, the return of two of Les Violons du Roy's most popular guest artists: Karina Gauvin and Marie-Nicole Lemieux, who will join forces on stage to perform some of Handel's most beautiful arias and duets, under the direction of Jonathan Cohen, in a program that touches on the quintessential Les Violons du Roy.
Then it's time to enjoy the 18th production of Handel's Messiah by Les Violons du Roy and La Chapelle de Québec, conducted by Bernard Labadie. This 40th anniversary Messiah will bring together the strengths of the choir, orchestra and their founding conductor, plus an exceptional quartet of soloists, including Liv Redpath and William Thomas in their Quebec debuts.
Among the guest artists who will once again dazzle audiences with their sensitivity and virtuosity are Kerson Leong and Antoine Tamestit, who have offered particularly heartfelt performances in recent years with Les Violons du Roy, and who will take part in daring programs. The former reunites with the orchestra and Nicolas Ellis for a program built around Mendelssohn's last string quartet and a creation, specially conceived for this formidable team of performers, by Kelly-Marie Murphy, one of Canada's most accomplished composers. The second, after a memorable debut with the orchestra in 2023, will be a new encounter just as exhilarating and moving, notably with a transcription for string orchestra of Shostakovich's 15th quartet.
Soprano Myriam LeBlanc and bass-baritone Stephen Hegedus, much appreciated by music lovers, will also be returning to La Chapelle de Québec in a program featuring the very first cantatas by J. S. Bach.
Grand premieres
The 2024-2025 season also features a number of major premieres. First, the season opens with countertenor Hugh Cutting, named BBC New Generation Artist in 2022 and the first countertenor to win the prestigious Kathleen Ferrier Prize in London. Conducted by Bernard Labadie, with whom he recently made his Carnegie Hall debut, he will perform two of Johann Sebastian Bach's finest cantatas for solo voice.
The orchestra is also delighted to welcome for the first time cellist Raphaël Pidoux, member and founder of the renowned Trio Wanderer, who will revive a truly forgotten treasure, Jean-Louis Duport's Cello Concerto No. 6 in D minor.
Presented only once, the two great arrangements of the two Baroque masterpieces, Bach's monumental Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor and Pachelbel's poignant Chaconne in F minor, created especially for Les Violons du Roy by Bernard Labadie, will be brought together for the first time in a single concert.
Jonathan Cohen, for his part, will present Mozart et l'amitié, based on the Salzburg genius' great clarinet concerto, with Stéphane Fontaine, principal clarinet of the Orchestre symphonique de Québec, making his first appearance as soloist with Les Violons du Roy.
Traditions and a Canadian tour
Music lovers will once again be able to enjoy the now-ubiquitous Chemin de Noël, a free event of the holiday season that unites sharing, beauty, spirituality and music. The concert raises funds that are donated to a different community organization each year.
The 11th year of the Apéro Series offers some of the most enjoyable 5 à 7 in Quebec City, at the Salle D'Youville in the Palais Montcalm, in an atmosphere of complicity and proximity with the musicians of Les Violons du Roy.
Accomplices Marie-Nicole Lemieux and Karina Gauvin, accompanied by Les Violons du Roy, will be on the road to visit Kingston, Toronto and Ottawa, in addition to their concerts in Quebec City and Montreal.
La Chapelle de Québec, for its part, will perform with the Orchestra of St. Luke's in April 2025, under the direction of Bernard Labadie, in J.S. Bach's St. John Passion.
Projects with young people and the community
For many years, the Les Violons du Roy team has been involved with the community and young people. Under the impetus of Jonathan Cohen, the Émergence program will welcome a 2nd cohort for the 2024-2025 season. This program supports high-calibre young professional musicians in their career development, thanks to privileged professional development and mentoring opportunities.
The Musiciens en herbe project enables elementary and high school students to share the stage with the orchestra's musicians. This season, students in the Musique-études program at La Seigneurie high school will have this privilege.
Tours of libraries and health care facilities, youth projects, competitions and an internship at Charlevoix's Domaine Forget are just some of the many concerts the orchestra gives in Quebec City, across the country and beyond our borders.
Subscription and ticketing
Audiences are invited to subscribe to our flexible series or à la carte packages, offering savings of 15 to 40% on regular ticket prices.
Music lovers can take advantage of an extraordinary 40% discount when subscribing to the Anniversary Series Les Grands Soirées, which includes the nine major evening concerts at the Palais Montcalm in Quebec City.
Concerts in the 2024-2025 season will take place at the Palais Montcalm - Maison de la musique in Quebec City, the Maison symphonique de Montréal, and Salle Bourgie at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.
Special rates are available for young people aged 18 to 34 and 17 and under, both for subscriptions and individual tickets.
Concerts at Salle Bourgie are on sale now. Concerts at the Palais Montcalm go on sale at noon on July 4, both by subscription and individually, while subscribers to the 2023-2024 season can take advantage of an exclusive re-subscription period from June 29 to July 4. At La Maison symphonique, subscription and single tickets will be available from 10 a.m. on July 4. Subscribers to the 2023-2024 season will enjoy the privilege of keeping their seats when they re-subscribe before July 26, 2024.
View Les Violons du Roy's 2024-2025 season brochures in Quebec City and Montreal.
violonsduroy.com
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Source : Les Violons du Roy
Contact: Communications Paulette Dufour
418 525-5455/ 418 576-3585 pdufourcom@gmail.com