Gabriel Cusson (2 April 1903,

Roxton Pond, Quebec Roxton Pond is a municipality in the Canadian province of Quebec, located within La Haute-Yamaska Regional County Municipality. The population as of the 2021 Canadian Census was 4,224. The municipality was created in 1997 with the merger of the P ...

- 18 Apr 1972,

Montreal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

) was a

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

and

music educator Music education is a field of practice in which educators are trained for careers as elementary or secondary music teachers, school or music conservatory ensemble directors. Music education is also a research area in which scholars do origina ...

. As a composer, his music was heavily influenced by the style of early 20th-century French composers. Most of his work remains unpublished, although a few of his compositions have been recorded including his ''Sérénade for orchestra'' and one of his suites by the

Orchestre Métropolitain The Orchestre Métropolitain (, OM) is a symphony orchestra in Montréal, Québec, formed in 1981. It performs primarily in the Montreal Symphony House at Place des Arts but also at Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier and Théâtre Maisonneuve. Outside th ...

. The Canadian publishing company La Bonne Chanson has printed a number of his

folksong Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has bee ...

arrangements. His other unpublished works include several

motet In Western classical music, a motet is mainly a vocal musical composition, of highly diverse form and style, from high medieval music to the present. The motet was one of the preeminent polyphonic forms of Renaissance music. According to the Eng ...

s, the

cantata A cantata (; ; literally "sung", past participle feminine singular of the Italian language, Italian verb ''cantare'', "to sing") is a vocal music, vocal Musical composition, composition with an musical instrument, instrumental accompaniment, ty ...

''À la gloire de Jeanne Mance'' (1942), and incidental music for ''

Antigone ANTIGONE (Algorithms for coNTinuous / Integer Global Optimization of Nonlinear Equations), is a deterministic global optimization solver for general Mixed-Integer Nonlinear Programs (MINLP). History ANTIGONE is an evolution of GloMIQO, a global ...

'' and the biblical dramas ''Jonathas'' and ''Tobie''.Gabriel Cusson
at

Encyclopedia of Music in Canada ''The Canadian Encyclopedia'' (TCE; ) is the national encyclopedia of Canada, published online by the Toronto-based historical organization Historica Canada, with financial support by the federal Department of Canadian Heritage and Society of Com ...

Training

Cusson was trained at the Institut Nazareth, a music conservatory in Montreal that awarded degrees through the

University of Montreal A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Univ ...

. While there he studied the

cello The violoncello ( , ), commonly abbreviated as cello ( ), is a middle pitched bowed (sometimes pizzicato, plucked and occasionally col legno, hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually intonation (music), tuned i ...

with Gustave Labelle,

singing Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define singi ...

with Alfred Lamoureux,

piano A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...

and

organ Organ and organs may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a group of tissues organized to serve a common function * Organ system, a collection of organs that function together to carry out specific functions within the body. Musical instruments ...

with Arthur Letondal, and

music theory Music theory is the study of theoretical frameworks for understanding the practices and possibilities of music. ''The Oxford Companion to Music'' describes three interrelated uses of the term "music theory": The first is the "Elements of music, ...

with both

Achille Fortier Achille Fortier (23 October 1864 – 19 August 1939) was a Canadians, Canadian composer and music educator. His compositional output includes a modest amount of choir, choral and chamber music, chamber works, several songs and motets, and a small ...

and

Romain Pelletier Romain Pelletier (sometimes spelled Peltier) (22 August 1875 – 24 November 1953) was a Canadian organist, choir conducting, conductor, composer, and music educator. His compositional output consists entirely of works for solo organ and mote ...

. He graduated from the school in 1924 with a

Bachelor of Music A Bachelor of Music (BMus; sometimes conferred as Bachelor of Musical Arts) is an academic degree awarded by a college, university, or conservatory upon completion of a program of study in music. The degree may be awarded for performance, music ed ...

and that same year won the

Prix d'Europe The Prix d'Europe () is a Canadian study grant that is funded by the Ministère des Affaires culturelles du Québec of the Government of Quebec. Established in 1911, the award has been distributed annually to a single individual through competition ...

for cello performance. That competition win enabled him to study at the

École Normale de Musique de Paris The École Normale de Musique de Paris "Alfred Cortot" (ENMP) is a leading conservatoire located in the 17th arrondissement of Paris. The school was founded in 1919 by Auguste Mangeot and Alfred Cortot. The term ''école normale'' (English: no ...

in France from 1924 to 1930 with such teachers as

Diran Alexanian Diran Alexanian () (April 12, 1881, Constantinople – 1954, Chamonix, France) was an Armenian cello teacher and one of the world's greatest virtuoso cellists. Early life Alexanian started his studies in music under the supervision of his mat ...

(cello),

Nadia Boulanger Juliette Nadia Boulanger (; 16 September 188722 October 1979) was a French music teacher, conductor and composer. She taught many of the leading composers and musicians of the 20th century, and also performed occasionally as a pianist and organis ...

(composition), and

Charles Panzéra Charles uguste LouisPanzéra (February 16, 1896 in Geneva – June 6, 1976 in Paris) was a Swiss people, Swiss operatic and concert baritone. Overview Panzéra's studies at the Conservatoire de Paris, Paris Conservatory under the tuition of ...

(voice).

Career

In 1931 Cusson returned to Montreal and became active as both a composer and teacher in that city. As a teacher he first worked as a private tutor in

counterpoint In music theory, counterpoint is the relationship of two or more simultaneous musical lines (also called voices) that are harmonically dependent on each other, yet independent in rhythm and melodic contour. The term originates from the Latin ...

, with

Jean Papineau-Couture Jean Papineau-Couture, (; November 12, 1916August 11, 2000) was a Canadian composer and academic. Born in Montreal, Papineau-Couture was the grandson of conductor and composer Guillaume Couture. As a child he studied piano with his mother. H ...

being one of his notable students during the 1930s. In 1943 he joined the music faculty of the newly established

Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal The Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal (, CMQM) is a music conservatory located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. In addition to the Montreal region, the school takes in students from nearby cities, including Granby, Joliette, St-Jean ...

(CMQM) at the invitation of

Wilfrid Pelletier Joseph Louis Wilfrid Pelletier (sometimes spelled Wilfred), (20 June 1896 – 9 April 1982) was a Canadian conductor, pianist, composer, and arts administrator. He was instrumental in establishing the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, serving ...

. He taught at the CMQM through 1971, where his notable students included Gaston Arel,

Raymond Daveluy Joseph Eugène Raymond-Marie Daveluy (; 23 December 1926 – 1 September 2016) was a Canadian composer, organist, music educator, and arts administrator. An associate composer of the Canadian Music Centre, his compositional output consisted mai ...

Kenneth Gilbert Kenneth Albert Gilbert (December16, 1931April15, 2020) was a Canadian harpsichordist, organist, musicologist, and music educator. Biography Born in Montreal, Gilbert studied at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal under Yvonn ...

Bernard Lagacé Bernard Lagacé (21 November 1930 – 11 February 2025) was a Canadian organist and musicologist. His two series of recitals covering the works of Johann Sebastian Bach are considered to be landmark events in the history of music in Montreal. He ...

, Aline Letendre, Lucienne L'Heureux-Arel, and Michel Perrault. A recital hall at the conservatoire bears his name. He also served as the president of the

Académie de musique du Québec An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of tertiary education. The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, founded approximately 386 BC at Akademia, a sanctuary of Athena, the go ...

from 1952 to 1953 and again from 1956 to 1959. Cusson also published works on the teaching of music, including ''Quelques souvenirs des années'' and ''30 et sur un sujet bien actuel'' ('' Vie musicale'', December 1970). He also wrote four volumes of

ear training In music, ear training is the study and practice in which musicians learn various aural skills to detect and identify pitch (music), pitches, interval (music), intervals, melody (music), melody, chord (music), chords, rhythms, solfeges, and other ...

music methods and exercises which remain unpublished. Manuscripts of these works and several of his unpublished scores are currently part of the collection at the

Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec The (; ; abbr. BAnQ) is a Quebec government agency which manages the province's legal deposit system, national archives, and national library. Located at the Grande Bibliothèque in Montreal, the BAnQ was created by the merging of the Biblioth ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cusson, Gabriel 1903 births 1972 deaths Canadian male composers Academic staff of the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal École Normale de Musique de Paris alumni Canadian music educators Université de Montréal alumni 20th-century Canadian composers 20th-century Canadian male musicians