Cultural return | The OSM exhumes its treasures

The thing is not very well known, but since the year of its creation, in 1935, the Montreal Symphony Orchestra (OSM) has assiduously accumulated thousands of objects and documents that bear witness to its rich history.

You can imagine that I happily accepted the OSM’s invitation to go and search the room where these photographs, recordings, correspondence, contracts, telegrams, programs and other artifacts are stored.

I was entitled to this privileged visit on the occasion of the launch of the celebrations surrounding the 90^e season of the OSM which will officially take off next fall. To kick off these festivities, a special event will take place on January 16.

But first let’s go back, somewhere in 1934, and find ourselves at a meeting in the company of Athanase David, then a Liberal MP for Terrebonne in Quebec (he is the grandfather of Françoise, Hélène, Pierre and Charles-Philippe), his wife Antonia Nantel, the music critic Henri Letondal, as well as Ernest Tétraut, Victor Doré, Ubald Boyer and Jean Lallemand. Because it is to these influential and determined music lovers that we owe the existence of this orchestra, one of the great prides of Quebec.

Some of these founding members then gravitated around the Montreal Orchestra, a group composed largely of musicians who found themselves unemployed after the arrival of sound cinema. Judging that this orchestra was poorly serving French-speaking musicians and music lovers, the group decided to distance itself to create the Concerts symphoniques de Montréal (the name of the OSM came in 1954).

To launch this enterprise, the organizing committee took great measures and undertook to repatriate Wilfrid Pelletier, who had been attached to the Metropolitan Opera in New York for several years. Enthusiastic by this challenge, the chef accepts this offer and returns to live in his hometown.

The first CSM concert was offered on January 14, 1935 in the auditorium of Le Plateau school, located in La Fontaine Park. Work totaling $22,000 is being used to renovate the hall so that it can better accommodate the orchestra and its musicians. It then costs $5 to subscribe to the six concerts of the season.

This fabulous story lies dormant today in the archives and score rooms of the Maison symphonique. It takes the form of tens of thousands of documents which, when you start leafing through them, guarantee thrills. We must see the care with which programs intended for school mornings were prepared in 1935 (an idea from Wilfrid Pelletier). Concert tickets are still present in certain leaflets.

What emotion I had when reading a telegram from Maurice Duplessis confirming that he would not be able to honor with his presence a certain concert, in 1951. Or the correspondence between Claude Robillard, responsible for parks at the City of Montreal, and the OSM team for the organization of an open-air concert in 1953.

I admit to having been fascinated by the advertising of the Dollar Symphony Forum where, for the modest sum of one dollar, one could attend a concert at the Montreal Forum in 1962. And also that of the OSM tour in Russia the same year.

I met archivist Sophie Rodrigue, whose role is to inventory and identify these countless documents.

In these boxes, many of which have not yet been opened, we find the programs of all the concerts presented over the past 90 years. They are very useful for knowing the works that were performed, in which program they fit and who conducted them. We discover in particular the details surrounding the passage of Leonard Bernstein, in 1944, or that of Igor Stravinsky, in 1946, who came to direct his own works, including Fire Bird.

“It’s still extraordinary, I work every day surrounded by treasures,” adds Sophie Rodrigue. These documents not only tell the history of the OSM, but also that of Quebec. For example, we see the evolution of women in advertisements. »

By the way, did you know that the famous Pop concerts began in 1969? The first were devoted to songs by Gilles Vigneault, Jean-Pierre Ferland and Robert Charlebois. The OSM archives contain symphonic arrangements of approximately 1,000 popular works.

Speaking of scores, it is impressive to see the shelves crumbling under these thousands of sheets that are indecipherable to ordinary mortals. These are archival documents, but above all reference tools. The music librarian Michel Léonard, guardian angel of these jewels, takes obvious pleasure in explaining how the bowing strokes are indicated (often by hand) and preserved for posterity.

Contrary to popular belief, string players do not decide individually how to apply bowing movements. These are determined in advance by the concertmaster. These shots are “pulled” or “pushed”. Once coordinated, these gestures provide effects, sounds and colors that become specific to an orchestra.

The history of the OSM is rich and prodigious. We haven’t finished telling it. Thanks to those who have protected this memory over the past nine decades, we have everything we need to do so.