Bernard Piché

Piché, Bernard
(Paul) Bernard Piché. Organist, composer, teacher, b Montreal 10 Apr 1908, d Trois Rivières 4 Dec 1989; lauréat organ (AMQ) 1929. His early musical studies were with Hervé Cloutier. He became organist in 1926 at St-Nicolas Church in Ahuntsic and then moved to Notre-Dame-de-la-Défense. He was awarded a grant by the Delphic Study Club of Montreal in 1929 and won the Prix d'Europe in 1932. He entered the Brussels Conservatory, where he studied with Paul de Maleingreau (piano, organ, fugue, counterpoint), and then went to Paris to work with Charles Tournemire. He was the regular organist 1932-45 at the Trois-Rivières Cathedral and gave a daily recital there for six weeks in 1934, devoting half of each day's program to Bach. In 1945 in the Quebec City Basilica he performed the music for the NFB film on the Casavant company, The Singing Pipes. In 1945, under the impresario Bernard Laberge, he undertook the first of several tours in the USA and Canada. He was the organist 1945-66 at St Peter and St Paul Church in Lewiston, Me, and also taught there and gave recitals in about 20 states. In 1966 he joined the staff of the Conservatoire de Trois-Rivières, where he taught until his retirement in 1973. He wrote several pieces for organ, of which six were recorded on CD by Michelle Quintal, including a Rhapsodie sur quatre noëls (Gray 1947), By the Sea (Fischer1953), and Introduction et Fugue sur l'Ite Missa est alléluiatique (also recorded by André Mérineau). Piché composed, as well, a mass for four mixed voices and organ.

See also Joseph Piché (his father) and Eudore Piché (his brother).

Author Suzanne Thomas, Stephen Willis

Bibliography

Dion-Lévesque, Rosaire. Silhouettes franco-américaines (Manchester, NH, 1957)

Quintal, Michelle. 'Un maître de l'orgue méconnu: Bernard Piché,' Sonances, vol 6, Oct 1986