Repertoire
Lonely Child
Born in Montreal, April 14, 1948
Died in Paris, March 7, 1983
When Quebec composer Claude Vivier was murdered in his Paris apartment at the age of 34, he was already highly regarded as one of Canada’s most important composers. Since that time Vivier’s reputation has taken on almost mythic proportions, and his music continues to be performed with a regularity seldom seen in contemporary composers. Following the announcement of Vivier’s death, critic and musicologist Harry Halbreich wrote in Harmonie-Panorama Musique that “his music really resembles no other, and he puts himself right on the fringe of all trends. His music, of a direct and disruptive expression, could bewilder only those hard-hearted people who are unfit to categorize this independent man of genius. Claude Vivier found what so many others have sought for, and still seek: the secret of a truly new simplicity.”
Vivier studied in Montreal, then in Holland, France and Germany. A deep affection for Asian cultures led him to an extended stay in Bali, whose music influenced his own. A fascination with plainchant deriving from his Catholic upbringing and an abiding concern with death and immortality also coloured his music. At the time of his own death he was writing a choral piece called Glaubst du an die Unsterblichkeit der Seele? (Do you believe in the immortality of the soul?) In the preface to the published score of Lonely Child, Jaco Mijnheer writes: “The music of Claude Vivier is a reflection of his personal life.… Both directly and indirectly, the themes of his compositions were inspired by his unknown family origins, his search for his mother, his religious vocation, his homosexuality and even his premature death. The 49 works composed during his brief career comprise the impressive legacy of an individual as passionate about life as he was about music.”
Vivier composed Lonely Child in 1980 on commission from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). Serge Garant conducted the premiere the following year with the CBC Vancouver Chamber Orchestra and soprano Marie‑Danielle Parent. The score is dedicated to the singer Louise André, a teacher at the Université de Montréal. Lonely Child is generally regarded as Vivier’s first mature work. The 20-minute composition is framed by similar purely instrumental passages, from which its melodic material is derived.
Vivier wrote the instrumental component first, then superimposed the text, which is mostly in French but incorporates also words from the composer’s own invented language derived from Malaysian and other languages Vivier spoke. As well as being Vivier’s first mature work, Lonely Child is also his first composition to utilize his “colours,” which Mijnheer describes as “harmonic spectra produced through the addition of frequencies.… In these ‘colours,’… the distinction between harmony and timbre disappears: the different instruments are barely discernible individually, but rather melt into the sound of the orchestra that, as such, becomes one immense instrument of colours.”
The text begins: “Beauteous child of light, sleep… forever sleep,” and ends: “Beyond time, my child appears, the stars in the sky are shining for you, Tazio, and will love you forever and ever.” It is obviously a message sung vicariously by the composer to the child of the work’s title. Vivier the orphan, Vivier the lost soul, Vivier the lonely child, is attempting, in his own words, “to reach this voice of the lonely child desiring to embrace the world with naïve love – this voice that all hear and want to dwell in forever.”
— Program notes by Robert Markow
Symphony No. 2
Artists
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Alexander Shelley succeeded Pinchas Zukerman as Music Director of Canada’s NAC Orchestra in September 2015. The ensemble has since been praised as being “transformed... hungry, bold, and unleashed” (Ottawa Citizen) and Shelley’s programming credited for turning the orchestra into “one of the more audacious in North America” (Maclean’s).
Shelley is a champion of Canadian creation; recent hallmarks include the multimedia projects Life Reflected and UNDISRUPTED,and three major new ballets in partnership with NAC Dance for Encount3rs. He is passionate about arts education and nurturing the next generation of musicians. He is an Ambassador for Ottawa’s OrKidstra, a charitable social development program that teaches children life skills through making music together.
Alexander Shelley is also the Principal Associate Conductor of London’s Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and, starting with the 2024–2025 season, Artistic and Music Director of Artis-Naples and the Naples Philharmonic in Florida, USA. In the spring of 2019, he led the NAC Orchestra on its critically acclaimed 50th Anniversary European tour, and in 2017, he led the Orchestra in a tour across Canada, celebrating Canada’s 150th anniversary. Most recently, he led the Orchestra in its first performance at New York’s Carnegie Hall in 30 years.
He has made eight recordings with the NAC Orchestra, including the JUNO-nominated New Worlds, Life Reflected, ENCOUNT3RS, The Bounds of Our Dreams, and the acclaimed Clara, Robert, Johannes four-album series, all with Canadian label Analekta.
The Music Director role is supported by Elinor Gill Ratcliffe, C.M., O.N.L., LL.D. (hc)
(1975-2020)
Born in Calgary, Alberta, Erin Wall grew up in Vancouver, BC and studied piano at the Vancouver Academy of Music. She pursued a singing career at Western Washington University, Aspen Summer Music Festival 1998, Rice University, Music Academy of the West 2000 and the Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Ryan Opera Center.
Erin developed into an extraordinary lyric soprano with an international career, and performed with most of the world’s great symphony orchestras and opera companies. She was acclaimed for her musicality and versatility, singing extensive opera and concert repertoire spanning three centuries, from Mozart and Beethoven to Britten and Strauss. She sang leading roles in many of the world’s great opera houses, including the Metropolitan Opera, Canadian Opera Company and the Lyric Opera of Chicago.
Ms. Wall made her debut with the NAC Orchestra in 2007 and was soloist for the Orchestra’s premiere of Zosha Di Castri’s Dear Life in 2015. She also appeared at the NAC in 2010 singing Mahler’s Eighth Symphony, a work that figured prominently in her concert career. She toured with the NAC Orchestra on their 50th anniversary European tour in 2019. Her discography includes the 2010 GRAMMY® award-winning recording of this symphony for Best Classical Album, released by the San Francisco Symphony in 2009.
Throughout her career, Erin was profoundly grateful for the mentorship opportunities she received as an artist and was committed to paying those experiences forward by nurturing the next generation of voices and musicians.