Lyse Richer

Richer, Lyse

Lyse Richer. Teacher, administrator, b Montreal 11 Sep 1939; BA (Montreal) 1958, B MUS (Montreal) 1960, M MUS piano (École Vincent-d'Indy) 1961, L MUS (Montreal) 1969. She studied 1951-61 at the École Vincent-d'Indy with Yvonne Hubert (piano) and Claude Champagne (composition) and 1965-70 at the University of Montreal with Serge Garant (composition) and Maryvonne Kendergi (musicology). She received a scholarship from the Ladies' Morning Musical Club and was a prize winner of the MSO's Matinées symphoniques in 1958 and of the Ottawa Music Festival in 1959.

Richer taught piano 1956-63 at the École Vincent-d'Indy and 1966-76 at the University of Montreal, where she was also in charge of graduate studies in musicology, in the history of Canadian music section. She received bursaries from the Quebec government 1968-71 and from the Canada Council 1974-5.

In 1971 Richer prepared the inventory of the Wilfrid Pelletier collection for a prospective acquisition by the BN du Q. That same year she became the administrative director of MUSCADET (later MUSCADØC) - the computerized processing of data on music in Canada - a project which she discussed in CMB (Spring-Summer 1974) but which was put in abeyance in 1975.

From 1978 to 1982, she was a researcher, journalist, and producer of CBC radio and TV broadcast series. She was director general 1980-2 of the Groupe Nouvelle-Aire and was entrusted with the 1982 program of the Quebec Summer Festival. She was director general and secretary 1982-6 and special advisor 1988-9 to the board of directors of the Conseil des arts de la Communauté urbaine de Montréal. From 1986 to 1988 she was general director of arts and policy planning in the Cultural Affairs department of Communications Canada. In 1989 she and an associate, Jeannette Laquerre, set up Les Productions Tintam'Art Inc, a company specializing in project management, the planning and development of cultural enterprises, and the management of performing arts productions.

Richer has given lectures and papers at conferences and is the author of articles on Canadian composers in the Dictionary of Contemporary Music, Le Musicien éducateur (no. 2, 3, 1974), Contemporary Canadian Composers / Compositeurs canadiens contemporains, The New Grove, and EMC. She was vice-president 1977-9 of the Montreal Canadian Music Centre. In 1984 she became the director of the music collection of Cahiers du Québec published by Hurtubise HMH. She contributed the program notes and the sound documentary included in the RCI Anthology of Canadian Music devoted to Pierre Mercure (4-ACM 35), released on CD in 1990.