Skip to page content
  • WDCH
  • Bernard Labadie Leads the Los Angeles Philharmonic in a Program of Handel and Haydn
  • Apr. 3, 2009
  • Program Also Features Organist Richard Paré in His Walt Disney Concert Hall Debut and LA Phil Principal Concertmaster Martin Chalifour

    FRIDAY – SATURDAY, APRIL 3 – 4, 2009, AT 8 PM; SUNDAY, APRIL 5, 2009, AT 2 PM

    Conductor Bernard Labadie returns to Walt Disney Concert Hall to lead the Los Angeles Philharmonic in a program of works by Handel and Haydn, Friday and Saturday, April 3 and 4, at 8 p.m., and Sunday, April 5, at 2 p.m. Canadian organist Richard Paré makes his Walt Disney Concert Hall debut as he performs Handel’s Organ Concerto in D minor, Op. 7, No. 4, and LA Phil Concertmaster Martin Chalifour is the featured soloist in Haydn’s Violin Concerto in C.

    George Frideric Handel basically invented the solo organ concerto, for his own use at performances of his oratorios. These interludes became very popular and were advertised features of the oratorio concerts. His Op. 7, No. 4 may have been the “new Concerto on the Organ” promoted for the premiere of the Occasional Oratorio in 1746, but no complete autograph score exists to verify this.

    Haydn’s Violin Concerto was created to show off the composer’s skills as much as the soloist’s artistry. The piece was written after he joined the imposing musical establishment of the Esterházy court as Vice-Kappellmeister in 1761, and his compositional focus was on instrumental music. Haydn’s Seven Last Words of Our Savior on the Cross was written in 1786, a time when he was enjoying a great deal of celebrity throughout Europe. The work serves as the contemporary equivalent of a dramatic multi-media work, based on the seven phrases Christ spoke from the cross as recorded in the Bible. In the LA Phil performance, an actor will read those phrases during the performance.

    Conductor Labadie made his LA Phil debut in 2003 at the Hollywood Bowl and last led the orchestra at Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2006. Paré, equally skilled in organ and harpsichord, tours frequently through Canada and Europe.

    An opportunity to learn more about the program is free to all ticket holders at Upbeat Live, which takes place in BP Hall one hour prior to each concert. Christopher Russell, Director of Orchestral Studies at Azusa Pacific University and Coordinator of the Orchestral Program at Orange County High School of the Arts, hosts.

    BERNARD LABADIE has established himself worldwide as one of the leading conductors of the Baroque and Classical repertoire. Canada’s eminent critic William Littler called him the “King of the Classical,” and upon hearing his Los Angeles Philharmonic Messiah, the LA Weekly declared that “the Labadie Messiah was one of those legendary occasions when music you think you know front and back turns into an exhilarating discovery.” Much of Labadie’s unique reputation is the result of his work with Les Violons du Roy and La Chapelle de Québec, which he founded in 1984 and 1985, respectively, and continues to lead as music director to this day. With the two ensembles he regularly tours Canada, the U.S. and Europe, in major venues and festivals such as Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, Walt Disney Concert Hall, Kennedy Center, the Barbican, the Concertgebouw and the Salzburg Festival, among others. He will lead both groups in Handel’s Messiah and Bach’s Christmas Oratorio at Carnegie Hall in December 2009. Labadie is passionate about opera and equally at home on the concert stage. September 2009 will mark his debut with the Metropolitan Opera in Mozart’s Magic Flute and he has also become a sought-after guest conductor with all major North American orchestras. Since his triumphant debut with the Minnesota Orchestra in 1999, he has conducted the New York and Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestras, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the symphony orchestras of Boston, San Francisco, St. Louis, Houston, Atlanta, Detroit, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, the New World Symphony in Miami, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, among others. Upcoming debuts include the Chicago Symphony and the Cleveland Orchestra. Increasingly active outside North America, recent guest appearances include the Royal Scottish National Orchestra in Glasgow, the Northern Sinfonia in Newcastle, the Chamber Orchestra of the Liceu in Barcelona, the Musikkollegium Winterthur (Switzerland), the NDR Orchestra in Hannover and the Melbourne Symphony. Upcoming seasons will feature debuts with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra (in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion), the Swedish Chamber Orchestra, the Sydney Symphony and the Malaysian Philharmonic. Labadie is also very much in demand with period instrument orchestras. He has conducted the Orchestra of the Collegium Vocale Ghent, the Philharmonia Baroque in San Francisco, the New York Collegium, the Handel & Haydn Society in Boston and l’Ensemble Arion in Montreal. Future engagements include debuts with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and the Academy of Ancient Music. Labadie’s extensive discography includes many recordings on the Dorian label, including Handel’s Apollo e Dafne and his collaboration with Les Violons du Roy and La Chapelle de Québec of Mozart’s Requiem, both of which won a Juno award in Canada. Other recordings feature his own arrangements of J.S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations and The Art of Fugue, among others. His most recent releases feature Vivica Genaux and Les Violons du Roy on the Virgin Classics label (2006) and Handel’s Water Music on ATMA. A complete recording of C.P.E. Bach’s Cello Concertos with Truls Mørk and Les Violons du Roy will be released in 2009 (Virgin Classics). He also appears regularly on radio and television broadcasts on the CBC/Radio-Canada network. For his achievements, the Canadian government honored him with the appointment as “Officer of the Order of Canada” in 2005 and Quebec made him a “Chevalier de l’Ordre National du Québec” in 2006. Bernard Labadie completed most of his musical training in his native Québec City at the School of Music of Laval University as well as the conservatories of Quebec and Montreal. 

    RICHARD PARÉ, harpsichordist of the Québec Symphony Orchestra and the titular organist of the Saint-Martyrs-Canadiens church in Québec city, divides his professional activities between the two instruments. He studied both at the Québec City Conservatory, where he graduated with three Premier Prix diplomas in organ, harpsichord and chamber music. Paré has served as a professor of music at the Laval University of Québec since 2001, where he teaches organ, harpsichord and ancient music. Founding member of the chamber orchestra Les Violons du Roy, Paré has toured with them on many occasions, in France, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Austria, England, the United States and throughout Canada, and together they’ve released 12 recordings through the Dorian recording company. In 2006, Virgin Classic recording company released a CD of Paré performing Handel and Hasse works with mezzo-soprano Vivica Genaux. With the Musica Franca Ensemble he recorded works of Joseph Bodin de Boismortier. Paré has been invited by various concert societies as soloist and continuist, throughout the Province of Québec. Additionally, he has been invited three times to play with the New-World Symphony Orchestra in Miami. Recently he was guest soloist with the New York Philharmonic in a Bach sinfonia and an organ concerto by G.F. Handel.

    MARTIN CHALIFOUR began his tenure as Principal Concertmaster of the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1995. The recipient of various grants and awards in his native Canada, he graduated with honors from the Montreal Conservatory at the age of 18 and then moved to Philadelphia to pursue studies at the Curtis Institute of Music. In 1986, Chalifour received a Certificate of Honor at the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow; he was a laureate of the Montreal International Competition the following year. Since then he has concertized extensively, playing hundreds of concerto performances from a repertoire of more than 50 works. He has appeared as soloist with conductors such as Pierre Boulez, Charles Dutoit, Christoph Eschenbach, Sir Neville Marriner and Esa-Pekka Salonen. Outside the U.S., he has appeared as a guest soloist with the Auckland Philharmonia, the Montreal Symphony, the Hong Kong Philharmonic, the National Orchestra of Taiwan and the Malaysian Philharmonic, among others. Chalifour began his orchestral career in 1984 with the late Robert Shaw and the Atlanta Symphony, playing as Associate Concertmaster for six years. Subsequently he occupied the same position for five years in the Cleveland Orchestra, where he also served as Acting Concertmaster under Christoph von Dohnányi. While in Cleveland, Chalifour taught at the Cleveland Institute of Music and was a founding member of two chamber ensembles, Myriad and the Cleveland Orchestra Piano Trio. Chalifour is a frequent guest at several summer music festivals. Maintaining close ties with his native Québec, he has returned there to teach and appear as soloist with the Québec Symphony. Chalifour and two of his Philharmonic colleagues, Joanne Pearce Martin and Peter Stumpf, met in 1981 while all three were studying at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia; they recently joined forces to form the Los Angeles Philharmonic Piano Trio. Martin Chalifour is a professor at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music.

    The Los Angeles Philharmonic Association, under Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen, presents the finest in orchestral and chamber music, recitals, new music, jazz, world music and holiday concerts at two of the most remarkable places anywhere to experience music – Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Hollywood Bowl. In addition to a 30-week winter subscription season at Walt Disney Concert Hall, the LA Phil presents a 12-week summer festival at the legendary Hollywood Bowl, summer home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and home of the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra. In fulfilling its commitment to the community, the Association’s involvement with Los Angeles extends to educational programs, community concerts and children's programming, ever seeking to provide inspiration and delight to the broadest possible audience.

    EDITORS PLEASE NOTE:

    FRIDAY, APRIL 3, 2009, AT 8 PM

    SATURDAY, APRIL 4, 2009, AT 8 PM

    SUNDAY, APRIL 5, 2009, AT 2 PM


    WALT DISNEY CONCERT HALL

    111 S. Grand Avenue, Los Angeles



    BERNARD LABADIE, conductor

    MARTIN CHALIFOUR, violin

    RICHARD PARÉ, organ



    HANDEL Organ Concerto in D minor, Op. 7, No. 4

    HAYDN Violin Concerto in C

    HAYDN Seven Last Words of Our Savior on the Cross

    An opportunity to learn more about the program is free to all ticket holders at Upbeat Live, which takes place in BP Hall one hour prior to each concert. Christopher Russell, Director of Orchestral Studies at Azusa Pacific University and Coordinator of the Orchestral Program at Orange County High School of the Arts, hosts.

    Tickets ($42 - $147) are on sale now at the Walt Disney Concert Hall Box Office, online at LAPhil.com, or via credit card by phone at 323.850.2000. When available, choral bench seats ($17), will be released for sale to selected Philharmonic, Colburn Celebrity Recital, and Baroque Variations performances beginning at noon on the Tuesday of the second week prior to the concert. A limited number of $10 rush tickets for seniors and full time students may be available at the Walt Disney Concert Hall box office two hours prior to the performance. Valid identification is required; one ticket per person; cash only. Groups of 12 or more may be eligible for special discounts for selected concerts and seating areas. For information, please call 323.850.2000.

    # # #

  • Contact:

    Sophie Jefferies, sjefferies@laphil.org, 213.972.3422; Lisa White, lwhite@laphil.org, 213.972.3408; Photos: 213.972.3034