Canadian composer Jacques HÉTU dies
Thursday 11 February 2010
MONTRÉAL - Last Tuesday Canada's most performed composer Jacques HÉTU (1938-2010) died.
At the age of 17 Jacques Hétu started to study piano, harmony en Gregorian chant at the University of Ottawa. One year later he entered the Montreal Conservatory where he was taught by Clermont Pépin (composition and counterpoint), Isabelle Delorme (harmony) en Jean Papineau-Couture (fugual techniques). During the summer of 1959, Hétu studied composition with Lukas Foss at the Berkshire Music Center in Tanglewood, Mass.
In 1961, he obtained the Prix D'Europe (a very prestigious prize which had not been awarded to a composer since 1927). This allowed him to continue his studies in Paris. He studied composition at the Ecole Normale with Henri Dutilleux where, in 1963, he was awarded a Diplôme d'Excellence. At the same time, he took courses in analysis with Olivier Messiæn at the Paris Conservatory.
The elements of Hétu's style can best be defined as neo-classical forms and neo-romantic expression in a musical language of 20th century techniques. In 1978 he wrote: "The point is not to seek an unimagined way of arranging sounds but rather to find one's own manner of thinking musically. True originality seems to me to be authentic rather than eccentric."
LINKS:
• Obituary
• Obituary (in French)
• Listen to the Viola Concerto op. 75
