Rose Goldblatt

Goldblatt, Rose

Rose Goldblatt. Pianist, teacher, administrator, b Montreal 28 Aug 1913, d Montreal 30 Sep 1997; ARCM 1935. She began piano studies in 1918 at the Canadian Academy of Music in Montreal with Boris Dunev and Arthur Letondal, gave her first public recital at the Windsor Hotel, at six, and continued studies with Stanley Gardner in 1922. Awarded the five-year Strathcona scholarship of the RCM in 1929, she studied with Kendall Taylor (piano), Harold Craxton (theory), and Patrick Hadley (composition) 1930-5, making her London debut in 1935. Subsequently she worked with the Busoni disciple Egon Petri in New York. Throughout this period, she also received the Cécile Léger Scholarship awarded by the Ladies' Morning Musical Club.

Returning to Montreal, she performed for many decades on radio and as soloist with the Little Symphony of Montreal, the CBC Symphony Orchestra, the Montreal Women's Symphony Orchestra, and the McGill Chamber Orchestra, on CBC TV's 'L'Heure du Concert,' and gave two-piano recitals with Stanley Gardner. She also toured the USA, playing at New York's Town Hall, Chicago's Kimball Hall, and elsewhere. An early promoter of contemporary Canadian composition, she introduced much Canadian music to North American audiences and many works (eg, by Istvan Anhalt, Violet Archer, Wolfgang Bottenberg, Alexander Brott, Albertine Caron-Legris, Maurice Dela, Marvin Duchow, George Fiala, and Hector Gratton) were dedicated to her.

Goldblatt married Henry Finkel, an industrial designer, in 1937, the same year she opened a teaching studio in Montreal. She curtailed her concertizing after the births of her two children, concentrating on teaching and adjudicating and continuing to give solo recitals. Among her private students was the pop musician (with The Bells) and "New Age" composer, Robert Haig Coxon. During 1955-6 she was the host of 'Piano Party,' a weekly CBC radio program for teenagers.

Goldblatt joined the Faculty of Music, McGill University, in 1955 and was co-ordinator of local centres for its Preparatory School 1956-77. In 1965, she became the first chair of McGill University's Keyboard Department, remaining in that position until her retirement in 1978. Roseblatt worked with the QMTA since its inception in 1942 and was president of the association 1983-5 and of its provincial council 1987-9. In 1986, she organized a Composers' Symposium for the International Year of Canadian Music. In 1991 the QMTA established a Rose Goldblatt Trophy to be awarded annually. Goldblatt was a consultant to the Quebec Music Festivals, the Canadian correspondent for the European Piano Teacher's Association, and the Canadian representative for the International Society for the Study of Tension in Performance. She adjudicated at Canadian music competitions, and was elected Quebec vice-president of the CFMTA in 1991. She was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Great Britain, in 1987. The QMTA awards the Rose Goldblatt trophy annually to a deserving student.

Goldblatt appeared on CBC recordings, playing music by Kaufmann, Joachim, and Morawetz (RCI 133) and Fiala's Concertino, with a CBC Montreal string orchestra conducted by Roland Leduc, with Louis Charbonneau timpani, and Jacques LeComte trumpet (RCI 184/5-ACM 27). Radio Canada's recording "Fantasy on a Hebrew Theme" (SB-1814-1815, 1958) featured Goldblatt performing Joachim's "Éclosion" (which she premiered at McGill University in 1955), and the title selection, by Morawetz.