Germaine Malépart

Malépart, Germaine

Germaine Malépart. Pianist, teacher, b St-Vincent-de-Paul (now Laval), near Montreal, 7 Jul 1898, d Montreal 19 Apr 1963. She began studying piano at 7 with Arthur Letondal and made her debut at 13 at the Ladies' Morning Musical Club in Montreal. She won the Prix d'Europe in 1917 and a scholarship in 1920 from the Ladies' Morning Musical Club, and spent five years in Paris, working at the Paris Cons with Isidor Philipp and Maurice Amour (piano) and Roland Broche (harmony and composition). During that time she gave recitals at Salle Gaveau and Salle Pleyel. Returning to Montreal she performed 21 Nov 1922 at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. The reviewer for La Patrie wrote: 'Mlle Malépart plays with clarity and rhythmic precision and has a beautiful touch, firm phrasing with well-defined contours; in short, she communicates with sincerity and distinction.' She subsequently toured widely in Canada and the USA, gave radio recitals, and was a soloist in 1936 and 1941 with the CSM. In 1942 she began to concentrate on teaching at the École supérieure de musique d'Outremont (École Vincent-d'Indy) and at the CMM, where she gave the first instrumental course. Her many pupils included Lise Boucher, Andrée Desautels, Pierre Hétu, Mireille Lagacé, François Morel, Renée Morisset, Claude Savard, William Stevens, Gilles Tremblay, and Ronald Turini. A hall in the CMM was named for her in 1978.