François Morel

Canadian composer, pianist, conductor and teacher François Morel was born in Montreal on 14 March 1926. He studied at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal (1944-1953) with Claude Champagne (composition), Isabelle Delorme (harmony, counterpoint and fugue), Gérald Gagnier (conducting), Arthur Letondal, Germaine Malépart and Edmond Trudel (piano), and Jean Papineau-Couture (acoustics), and was one of the first Quebec musicians to learn exclusively at the CMM. He also studied composition with Edgard Varèse in New York.

A founding member of the Canadian League of Composers in 1951, he worked for CBC Radio (from 1956 until the late 1970s), composing call signs, incidental music, resarching and consulting.

Antiphonie (1953) was first performed at Carnegie Hall under Leopold Stokowski, beginning Morel's composing career.

Morel's Me duele España for guitar, written for Michael Laucke and recorded on Radio Canada International RCI 457, won the 1979 Grand Prix du Disque (best Canadian recording) of the Canadian Music Council. His music has often been played by the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal.

He became a Knight of the National Order of Quebec in 1994.

François Morel died on 14 January 2018, aged ninety-one.

A selection of articles about François Morel

CD Spotlight. Entertaining Tricks - Couperin's 'Apothéoses', heard by Robert Anderson. '... a stylish account of the music ...'