Jean-Paul Major

Jean-Paul Major

Jean-Paul Major. Flutist, teacher, born Ville St-Laurent (Montréal) 28 Apr 1929; died at Montréal, 11 Apr 2011. First Prize winner for flute by the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal (CMM), 1950. Major played in a brass band before entering the CMM in 1944. There he studied flute with Hervé Baillargeon, René Le Roy, and Marcel Moyse. Graduating in 1950 he spent another year with Moyse and studied bass with Roger Charbonneau. He also won an award from Les Amis de l'art at this time. In 1973, on a bursary from the Québec government, he studied with Jean-Pierre Rampal and Maxence Larrieu at the Académie internationale d'été in Nice.

Major was a member of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra (MSO) 1950-71 and the Quebec Symphony Orchestra 1955-7, and performed often as a soloist with such chamber music groups as the McGill Chamber Orchestra, the Masella Woodwind Quintet, the St-Laurent Cegep ensemble, and the SMCQ. For the SMCQ he performed Berio's Sequenza I, Antonio Tauriello's Serenata II, and Gerardo Gandini's Il Concertino and took part in two European tours, in March 1972 (Festival de Royan) and November 1977 (Musicanada). Major taught 1967-70 at the Cons de Trois-Rivières, 1967-70 at McGill University and the University of Montreal, 1967-74 at the Vanier and St-Laurent Cegeps, 1970-1 at the Camp musical du Lac St-Jean, and 1973-4 at the Youth and Music Canada Orford Art Centre. He began teaching in 1970 at the CMM, and two of his pupils were Marcel Saint-Jacques and Robert Langevin, both Prix d'Europe winners.

See also Discographies for J. Beaudry, Garant, and Société de musique contemporaine du Québec (SMCQ).