Tallula Russell – Contributor

Quebecois composer Francois Dompierre gave a very charming Donald Lecture on Nov. 12 in league with this year’s Humanities Fest. The talk was part interview, part performance and part open choir rehearsal for the BU singers. The lecture led up to the university choir working with the Sherbrooke Symphony Orchestra and the University of Sherbrooke choir to perform Dompierre’s Requiem on Sunday, Nov. 23, in Salle Maurice O’Bready. The conversation and rehearsal were a fascinating and enjoyable glimpse into the process of creating such momentous pieces of art.

Francois Dompierre’s interview with BU Choir Director and music professor Fannie Gaudette was both playful and insightful. Dompierre answered questions about his start in music, the nature of composition and his process. Dompierre discussed how he was a “lazy” student and would not memorize pieces, but instead improvise in the style of whoever he was tasked with playing. When asked to describe his composition process, Dompierre got up and went to the piano on the other side of the stage and started improvising a piece right there on the spot. He said he gets a rhythm in his head, makes a simple melody to go over it, and then continues from there. He added that composing an orchestra piece is much like composing a pop song at the start, but that one takes a simple melody and then “builds a big house out of it.”

Interspersed in the interview were two beautiful performances of his pieces “Phil’s Fill” and “Pavane Solitaire” performed by Gaudette on piano, Mathieu Désy on double bass and Philippe Dunnigan on violin. The interview wrapped up after an hour, and the open rehearsal for the BU Singers began. Over one hundred singers took to the stage as Sherbrooke Symphony Orchestra Conductor Jean-Micheal Malouf stepped up onto the stage alongside the Orchestra’s Pianist Carmen Picard.  They rehearsed around half of the twelve-movement piece, stopping here and there to sharpen up certain spots. 

The choir has been working on this piece since the beginning of September, and the most difficult sections are sung by small groups rather than the whole 140-person choir. 

The evening ended with a surprise rendition of one of Dompierre’s most famous pieces, “L’âme à la Tendresse”, performed with solos from Gaudette and students Laurence Groleau and Romy Pelchat and recent graduate Maude Zulauff. The entire showing was a beautiful and informative evening of music composition.