Favourite of Éric Champagne - Composer and collaborator for the OM

The coup de coeur of Éric Champagne

Pas de deux (Andante meastoso) from Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker

My first encounter with the work…
When I was younger, I attended a performance of the ballet The Nutcracker that my cousin danced in (she played a mouse and a snowflake). Lots of numbers from the ballet are super well known and it’s hard not to be enchanted by this magical music. I remember the very intense emotions I felt when I heard the Pas de deux in Act II. It’s so beautiful, radiant, intimate yet grandiose, magical, tragic and more. This mix of extreme passions that drives Tchaikovsky’s music is what makes him one of my favourite composers.

My favourite passage
When the tension ratchets up at 2 minutes 25 seconds to arrive at the point where the orchestra takes up the theme with a deep and sustained (3 minutes) passion. But, surprise! It’s not the climax of the piece because the orchestra roars back and the theme explodes with new power and strength at 3 minutes 30 seconds. At that exact point, the orchestration is so spectacular and generous that I’m blown away every time I hear it. The way the trumpet gives a grandiose and striking gleam to the theme with the piccolo and harp swirling around is something to hear!

Listen closely and pay special attention to:
The main tune (so simple – it’s a descending scale – and yet so beautiful, with its warm sound and passionate emotion all bathed in the soft, illuminating aura created by the harp arpeggios), the orchestral colours (including the bass clarinet playing in a high register at 1 minute 56 seconds), but also, overall, the warmth of the string section, the magic of the harp, the lightness of the solos and the dramatic presence of the trombones.

Winner of the Opus award for discovery of the year in January 2014, composer Éric Champagne holds a master’s in composition from the Université de Montréal.

His music is regularly performed in Quebec and across Canada as well as in the United States, Europe and India by renowned ensembles and soloists, including the Academic Chamber Orchestra Zurich (Switzerland), Montreal, Quebec City, Vancouver and Kitchener-Waterloos symphony orchestras, National Academy Orchestra of Canada (Hamilton), Toronto Youth Symphony Orchestra, University of Oklahoma Wind Symphony and Quatuor Molinari. Composer in residence at the Orchestre Métropolitain from 2012 to 2014, Éric Champagne regularly collaborates with the Orchestre on various musical and educational projects.

Éric Champagne has won several awards and honours. These include CALQ’s Creation of the Year – Montreal award for his Symphony No. 1, premiered in March 2014 by the Orchestre Métropolitain, the University of Oklahoma’s Michael Hennagin Memorial Composition Prize for his piece Champ-de-Mars, par jour de lumière, the Prix collégien de musique contemporaine for his piece Vers les astres, first prize in the Orchestre de l’Université de Montréal’s composition competition and first prize in the organ composition competition of Sherbrooke’s Ensemble Musica Nova.