György Ligeti: the musical soul of Kubrick’s visions.

From the hypnotic 2001: a Space Odyssey to the bold Eyes Wide Shut and the eerie The Shining, Stanley Kubrick’s films give a prominent place to the music of the great Hungarian composer György Ligeti. Several works by the composer are in fact present throughout the director’s cinematography. In this concert, presented as part of the 12th edition of the Montreal/New Music festival on the theme of “Music and Images”, the McGill Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of Alexis Hauser, performs representative pieces of these three iconic films.

Also on the program: a premiere commissioned by the SMCQ from young composer Liam Ross Gibson, a singular emerging voice on the Canadian musical landscape, Prokofiev’s Second Piano Concerto with soloist Alexey Shafirov, and the spectacular orchestral fresco Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Richard Strauss’s famous symphonic poem, which also majestically echoes Kubrick’s cinema.

Artists
McGill Symphony Orchestra

Alexis Hauser, conductor

Winner of the prestigious Koussevitzky Conducting Prize of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and recipient of the Leonard Bernstein Scholarship for Tanglewood 1974, Alexis Hauser was born in Vienna, Austria, and graduated with distinction from Hans Swarowsky’s master class 1970 (Vienna Musik-Universität) as well as from master courses with George Hurst (Canford 196768, England), Franco Ferrara (Accademia Chigiana Siena 1969) and Herbert von Karajan (Salzburg Sommerakademie 1970).

After his inaugural season as Director of the McGill Symphony Orchestra 2001/2 he invitations to appear at the International Festival of Lanaudière and also in New York at Carnegie Hall. The “Montreal Gazette” praised Hauser’s performance of Verdi’s Falstaff as a “revelation” and listed his interpretation of Mahler’s Tenth Symphony (which was released meanwhile in public by McGill Records) as one of the top 10 of 2002 Classical Music Performances. In 2004, Hauser performed the Canadian premiere of the original 1880 version of Mahler’s “Das klagende Lied”.  In 2005 he revived, together with Stage Director François Racine, Harry Somer’s Opera “Louis Riel”  at Montreal’s Place des Arts, which was awarded the Prix Opus “Événement musical de l’année” by the Conseil québécois de la musique. Of this opera, Hauser arranged an orchestral suite which was premiered in 2024.

In 2013 Hauser started a new position in Montreal as Artistic Director of “Pronto Musica”, an orchestra made up of excellent young professional musicians. Dedicated also to Canadian music, the ensemble performed Denis Gougeon’s “La Fête sacrée” in March 2013 and Alan Belkin’s Overture “Night Passages” in February 2015. Highlights included Tchaikovsky’s String Serenade op. 48 and Shostakovich’s Chamber Symphony op. 110a and Fauré’s Requiem.

Jean-Willy Kunz, organ

Jean-Willy Kunz, Organist-in-Residence with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, is responsible for the development and enhancement of the Grand Orgue Pierre-Béique. He has performed as a soloist with the Orchestre symphonique de Québec, Les Violons du Roy and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and has premiered works by significant composers. Owing to his various interests, Jean-Willy Kunz is involved in numerous projects that bring a fresh perspective to the organ: jazz with saxophonist Branford Marsalis; pop with Pierre Lapointe; stage music with Cirque du Soleil; contemporary music with Quatuor Bozzini; or Baroque music with Ensemble Caprice. His discography includes several recordings that demonstrate the versatility of his musical influences, notably Symphonie et créations for organ and orchestra with the OSM (Juno award, 2016). Jean-Willy Kunz is Professor of Organ at the Conservatoire de musique de Montréal and Artistic Director of the Canadian International Organ Competition. 

Alexey Shafirov, piano

Alexey Shafirov is an Israeli pianist born in Russia. He holds degrees in piano performance from the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance in Israel, as well as from the Schulich School of Music at McGill University in Canada, where he is currently pursuing his doctoral studies under the direction of Ilya Poletaev and Michael McMahon. His former teachers include Eitan Globerson, Chana Shalgi, Yaron Rosenthal and Inna Lerner.

Alexey has received various solo piano awards, including the McGill University Piano Concerto Competition 2023-2024. However, Alexey also devotes significant efforts to music as a pedagogue, piano accompanist, vocal coach and, more recently, researcher, focusing on the correlation between vocal and instrumental music across different musical eras. He frequently participates in opera productions and vocal festivals, including IMVAJ, the Lyric Opera Studio in Jerusalem, the Vocal Academy in Lachine and the Franz-Schubert Institute in Vienna. Back in Israel, Alexey worked as a choral conductor and teacher with the Ankor girls’ choir, with whom he toured Israel, Germany and Japan. Last year, he graduated from McGill-UdeM’s prestigious Piano-Vocal Arts residency, where he learned from the world’s leading vocal coaching experts

Program
György LIGETI, excerpts of Musica ricercata (1951-53)
György LIGETI, Lontano (1967)
Sergueï Sergueïevitch PROKOFIEV, Piano concerto no 2, op 16 (1912-13, 23)
Liam GIBSON, Continental Divide (2025) – Premiere, commission by SMCQ
Richard STRAUSS, Also sprach Zarathustra, op 30 (1896)

To purchase your tickets, visit: www.placedesarts.com