Claude Vivier (1948-1983).
Yesterday I was pleasantly surprised to receive a package from Boosey & Hawkes, in New York. In it, I found a catalogue, fresh off the presses, advertising the scores of Canadian composer Claude Vivier.
An accompanying press release declares that Vivier is “commonly thought to be the most important composer Canada has yet produced.”
Presumably B&H isn’t trying to damn Vivier with faint praise – after taking the trouble to publish his complete oeuvre, and also this handsome trilingual catalogue. But I fear this press release may have missed its mark. Seeing as the wider world shows little interest in Canadian music, telling people that Vivier is the best among a group of composers they aren’t much interested in may not be the best way to sell his work.
An accompanying press release declares that Vivier is “commonly thought to be the most important composer Canada has yet produced.”
Presumably B&H isn’t trying to damn Vivier with faint praise – after taking the trouble to publish his complete oeuvre, and also this handsome trilingual catalogue. But I fear this press release may have missed its mark. Seeing as the wider world shows little interest in Canadian music, telling people that Vivier is the best among a group of composers they aren’t much interested in may not be the best way to sell his work.
If I were trying to sell Vivier to the world, here’s what I’d say: “Claude Vivier came from Canada – a country where many composers are content to adopt and mimic fashionable trends in new music that originate in places that “matter,” such as Paris and New York. Yet although Vivier was well versed in these trends, and in many other things as well (such as the musics of Asia), he had such a rich and powerful voice that his works transcend mere imitation.”
And that, I believe, is what makes the few Canadian composers whom the world has at least noticed, such as Vivier, stand out from the rest of the pack. The problem with most Canadian composers is not that their work is not good enough, but that it often lacks distinctiveness and a clear personal stamp. Vivier had these qualities in spades.
I’m certainly not fond of everything Vivier wrote: I find some of his works opaque and impenetrable – as though he were writing letters to himself in an elaborate code that only he could understand. But when Vivier opened his soul to the world, a dazzling and compelling flood of music poured out.
If you’d like to know more about this remarkable composer and his music, click here. And below, you’ll find a YouTube video of a Vivier piece I like very much: his Lonely Child, from 1980.
© Colin Eatock 2012
And that, I believe, is what makes the few Canadian composers whom the world has at least noticed, such as Vivier, stand out from the rest of the pack. The problem with most Canadian composers is not that their work is not good enough, but that it often lacks distinctiveness and a clear personal stamp. Vivier had these qualities in spades.
I’m certainly not fond of everything Vivier wrote: I find some of his works opaque and impenetrable – as though he were writing letters to himself in an elaborate code that only he could understand. But when Vivier opened his soul to the world, a dazzling and compelling flood of music poured out.
If you’d like to know more about this remarkable composer and his music, click here. And below, you’ll find a YouTube video of a Vivier piece I like very much: his Lonely Child, from 1980.
© Colin Eatock 2012
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