La vie musicale en Nouvelle-France (review)

Abstract

La vie musicale en Nouvelle-France. By Elisabeth Gallat-Morin and Jean-Pierre Pinson, with collaboration of Paul-Andre Dubois, Conrad Laforte and Eric Schwandt. Redaction des encarts et recherche iconographique: Francois Filiatrault. Montreal: Septentrion, Cahiers des Ameriques, 2003. (Collection Musique.) [578 p. ISBN 2-89448-350-3. $42.95 Can.] Music examples, illustrations, tables, bibliography, discography, index, appendices. The publication of La vie musicale en Nouvelle France marks an important date for musicology in Quebec. In fact, this substantial book fills serious lacuna in history of music in and in Quebec. If specialized work of explorers in this area such as Helmut Kallmann, A History of Music in Canada, 1534-1914 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1960); Andree Desautels, trois âges de la musique au Canada-le premier âge: la Nouvelle-France au XVII^sup e^ et au XVIII^sup e^ siecle (in La musique, les homes, les instruments, les oeuvres . . ., 2 vols. ed. Norbert Dufourcq [Paris: Larousse, 1965]: 2:314-22); Willy Amtmann, La musique au Quebec, 1600-1875 (Montreal: Les Editions de l'homme, 1976), and an enlarged version of Music in Canada, 1600-1800 (Montreal: Habitex Books, 1975); Helmut Kallmann, Gilles Potvin, eds. Encyclopedia of Music in Canada, 2d ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993), as much as that of ethnologists and folklorists Ernest Gagnon, Chansons populaires du (Quebec: Bureaux du Foyer canadien, 1865); and Edouard-Zotique Massicotte and Marius Barbeau, Chants populaires du Canada (Journal of American Folklore 32, no. 123 [January-March 1919]: 1-89) have contributed to revealing existence of musical life in New France, no exhaustive research encompassing historical, sociological, ideological, institutional, and musicological aspects of period between founding of Quebec (1608) and Treaty of Paris (1763) has been undertaken, much less completed. The result of almost twenty years of research, present study answers many questions and from now on will serve as reference on subject, putting an end to long held belief in absence of significant musical activities in New France. The area under French rule was large, and authors have chosen to limit their work to the ecclesiastical, civil, and military center of New France, that is Saint Lawrence valley, what is Rimouski, up to Montreal and through to Quebec and Trois-Rivieres (pp. 17-18). Even Acadia, Louisiana, and New England receive coverage. The present work, written with erudition and great scholarly rigor, is distinguished as much by number and diversity of sources used-French and local, printed and manuscript-as by way materials are collated, scrutinized, analyzed, and discussed. The process has permitted establishment of facts and correction of errors and legends, but has also given birth to additional questions due to greater perspective on both religious and secular music. Quantitatively and qualitatively, critical apparatus shows honesty, weight, and quality of musicological approach. Ninety-seven illustrations and music examples, and biographical side bars relating to life of French composers with any influence or link to New France (edited by Francois Filiatrault), along with an ample number of tables are inserted into dense and detailed text, regularly relieved by picturesque descriptions of events of contemporary life. The epistolary remarks of Elisabeth Begon, a sort of Montreal Madame de Sevigne (p. 295) are most lively. In December of 1748 she writes, for example, today news is that everyone is learning to dance (p. 296), to great despair of members of clergy who strongly denounced such gatherings, dances, and parties and all of these lustful songs that only lead to shameful pleasures . . . quarrels and disgraceful illnesses (p. 298). The variety of musical life in France serves as backdrop to book, which is divided into two parts dedicated respectively to religious music (seven chapters) and music in society (five chapters). …