Auditorium de Québec

Auditorium de Québec. Designed by the US architect Walter S. Painter and built 1902-4 at 972 St-Jean St, Quebec City, on the initiative of the mayor, S.N. Parent. Of eclectic style, but referred to by architects as in the beaux-arts tradition, it was considered at the time to be 'the most perfect of its kind'. The amphitheatre measured 23 by 27 m and could hold more than 1600 spectators, while the stage had a surface area of 220.5 square m. The hall was inaugurated 31 Aug and 1 Sep 1903 by two concerts featuring the Société symphonique de Québec conducted by Joseph Vézina with a choir and a team of soloists which included Rosario Bourdon, Paul Dufault, Bernadette Dufresne, J.-A. Gilbert, Georges Hasneier [Haseneier], Eileen Millett, Émiliano Renaud, and Joseph Saucier.

Keywords

Concert Halls/Auditoriums

The management of the building initially was entrusted to professional administrators, whose program, dictated by too great a concern for profit, favoured foreign artists over opera and concert performances organized by local citizens. Some 20 years later, Nazaire LeVasseur was to draw up a gloomy balance-sheet of artistic life in the capital, stating that theatre in Quebec City, 'starting with the Auditorium, had become... a means of financial exploitation, totally devoid of skill, knowledge, and moral teaching'. In 1927 the architect H. Laberge remodelled the auditorium, and a 64-stop Casavant organ was installed. A second mortgage was required to cover the cost of the renovations; this was guaranteed by the Famous Players film distribution company which changed the Auditorium's name to the Capitol Theatre (Quebec City). In 1935, the architect Raoul Chenevert made further modifications: the theatre was transformed into a cinema and part of the building was converted into offices.After having been the property of United Cinema, a Quebec subsidiary of Famous Players, the Auditorium, abandoned in 1982, was given the status of historical monument in 1984. A Capitol Theatre collection, comprising a few artists' photographs, is held at the ANQ in Quebec City.

From the 1950s until 1971, when the Capitol Theatre became mainly a cinema, the auditorium had been, as Claude Paulette has stated, 'host to all the principal manifestations of Quebec life'. Besides the debuts of the Opéra français de Québec and the Théâtre lyrique de Nouvelle-France, it has presented performances by itinerant theatre companies, Canadian and foreign dance troupes, the TS, the MSO, and symphony orchestras from the USA and Europe. The Quebec Symphony Orchestra has continued to give gala soirées in it, as well as concerts for young people and symphony matinées. The orchestra also performed there in the 1975-6 season during a strike by employees of Quebec City's Grand Théâtre. Many solo recitals have been presented at the auditorium in the Soirées classiques, the Grands Classiques, and other such series, on the initiative of the Quebec impresarios Arthur Lavigne, J.-Albert Gauvin, and Émile Caouette. Among the distinguished recitalists have been Leopold Godowsky, Marcel Grandjany, Ernestine Schumann-Heink, Witold Malcuzynski, Ovide Musin, Ronald Turini, and Eugène Ysaÿe.

Author Lucien Poirier

Bibliography

Programme Souvenir de l'inauguration officielle de l'Auditorium de Québec (Quebec City 1903)

Doughty, Arthur George. Quebec Under Two Flags (Quebec City 1903)

LeVasseur, Nazaire. Réminiscences d'antan (Quebec City 1926)

Paulette, Claude. 'Les grands théâtres de Québec,' Culture vivante, 17, May 1970

Quebec City Le Soleil, 2 Sep 1978, 30 Nov 1981

Bossé, Eveline. Les grandes heures du Capitol : la vie artistique et culturelle de la ville de Québec dans son théâtre le plus prestigieux (Québec 1991)

Brulet, Françoise-Laure, Gingras, Miki, and Société du Théâtre Capitole de Québec. Réminiscences : Théâtre Capitole (Québec 1992)

Links to Other Sites

Images from the Turn of a Century: 1760-1840
This extensive online exhibition is devoted to 18th and 19th Century Québec art, literature, and music. From the Université du Québec.