Nominations for the 2025 Opus Awards

The finalists for the 28th Opus Awards Gala were announced on November 14. The gala, for its part, will take place on February 2, 2025, at 3 p.m., at the Bourgie Hall of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

This evening, as usual, will celebrate the artisans and significant achievements in the world of concert Music for the 2023-2024 season. This year, two additional prizes will be added to the 30 already awarded, namely those for the categories Album of the Year and Concert of the Year – Ancient, Classical, Romantic, Modern, Postmodern Impulses. Musical performances are planned during the evening and will be led by actor and host Jocelyn Lebeau. The event will be broadcast from 3 p.m. on Facebook.

CONCERT OF THE YEAR

CONCERT OF THE YEAR ― MEDIEVAL, RENAISSANCE, BAROQUE MUSIC

• Arion Baroque Orchestra – Acis, Galatea and Polyphemus
• Arion Baroque Orchestra – French connection
• Montreal Early Music Studio and Arion Baroque Orchestra – The Messiah
• Metropolitan Orchestra, Choir of the Metropolitan Orchestra – Handel’s Messiah
• Les Violons du Roy and La Chapelle de Québec – Vivaldi’s Glory

CONCERT OF THE YEAR ― CLASSICAL, ROMANTIC, POSTROMANTIC MUSIC

• Quebec Symphony Orchestra – Augustin Hadelich plays Brahms
• Marie-Nicole Lemieux, contralto, Karina Gauvin, soprano, Olivier Godin, piano – Karina Gauvin and Marie-Nicole Lemieux: divine duos!
• Stéphane Tétreault, cello, Olivier Bouchard, piano – Claude Debussy: Forgotten Images
• Sandra Murray, Claire Ouellet, Mariane Patenaude, Francis Perron, Romain Pollet, Pamela Reimer, pianos – Orford Six Pianos
• Metropolitan Orchestra – Aida at the end of the season

CONCERT OF THE YEAR ― MODERN, CONTEMPORARY MUSIC

• Four Molinari – Two
• Four Molinari – Le Quatuor selon Webern
• Montreal Symphony Orchestra – The Rite of Spring
• Four Cobalt – Feminine composition
• Drummondville Symphony Orchestra – Triomphe of the High

CONCERT OF THE YEAR ― CURRENT MUSIC, ELECTROACOUSTIC

• SuperMusic Ensemble – Monnomest
• Sixtrum Percussion – Directions 6
• Sixtrum Percussion – Transformations
• Chorale Joker – Chance
• Video phase – Alt-Escape

CONCERT OF THE YEAR ― JAZZ

• Benjamin Deschamps sextet – Augmented Reality
• Hugo Blouin – Sport national
• Rachel Therrien – Rachel Therrien Latin Jazz Project
• Confluence and François Bourassa Quarter – OFF JAZZ, opening night carte blanche to François Bourassa and Philippe Côté
• National Jazz Orchestra of Montreal – The National Jazz Orchestra invites Donny McCaslin

CONCERT OF THE YEAR ― TRADITIONAL QUEBEC MUSIC

• Cédric Dind-Lavoie, multi-instrumentalist, Alexis Chartrand and/or Dâvi Simard, violins – ARCHIVES
• Éric Favreau, Liz Carroll, violins, Stéphane Landry, accordion, Rachel Aucoin, Manon Turcotte, pianos, Owen Marshall, guitar, Sébastien Dionne, double bass – Grand concert of the Lévis Folklore Symposium, 1st edition
• É.T.É trad music – On these waters

CONCERT OF THE YEAR – WORLD MUSIC

• Cloisters – Momentum
• Small World Project – Macroscope
• Didem Başar, kanun, Patric Graham, percussion, Etienne Lafrance, bass player Quatuor Andara – Continuum

CONCERT OF THE YEAR – MULTIPLE REPERTOIRE

• Quebec Symphony Orchestra – Fazil Say, virtuoso of the extreme
• Metropolitan Orchestra – The Leningrad Symphony
• The Violins of the King – Fantastic dreams on a night of flying horses
• Metropolitan Orchestra – Mahler’s Sixth
• Marie-Josée Arpin, violin, Jean-Philippe Tanguay, transverse flute, Vincent Delorme, viola, Laurence Leclerc, cello – Carte blanche to Marie-Josée Arpin

CONCERT OF THE YEAR – ANCIENT, CLASSICAL, ROMANTIC, MODERN, POSTMODERN IMPULSE

• Cordâme – A female story
• Jean-François Bélanger, harp, tenor harp, double bass harp, and La Fresque Baroque Ensemble – The sacred and the profane
• Aaiguebelle Ensemble – The songs of my departures

CREATION OF THE YEAR

• Airat Ichmouratov – Meeting Point
• Jean Derome, Stéphane Mallarmé – A roll of the dice will never abolish chance
• Philippe Côté – Shades of Bowie
• Denis Gougeon – Jubilate!, Fantasy for organ and orchestra
• Denis Gougeon – Spassiba Yuli, for 2 cellos and strings

PRODUCTION OF THE YEAR ― YOUNG AUDIENCE

• Frédéric Demers, trumpet, Samuel Lalande-Markon, tuba – TNT’s symphonic adventure
• Orchester Métropolitain, Les Petits Chanteurs du Mont-Royal – Symphonic master key
• Good riddance – I’m coming to your place!
• The Music Mill – In the Oreille kitchen
• Production Cont’Opéra, Faculty of Music of Laval University, Quebec Opera Festival, co-producers – The ugly duckling

ALBUM OF THE YEAR

ALBUM OF THE YEAR ― MEDIEVAL, RENAISSANCE, BAROQUE MUSIC

• Christopher Palameta, Notturna – Calcutta 1789: At the crossroads of Europe and India
• Arion Baroque Orchestra – The King’s dinners
• Anne Thivierge, Mélisande Corriveau, Eric Milnes – Tender echoes

ALBUM OF THE YEAR ― CLASSICAL, ROMANTIC, POSTROMANTIC MUSIC

• David Jacques – 16 Guitar Stories – Vol. III
• Louis-Pierre Bergeron, Meagan Milatz – Bravura
• Stéphane Tétreault, Olivier Hébert-Bouchard – Claude Debussy: Images found
• Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Metropolitan Orchestra – Sibelius 2 & 5
• Rafael Payare, Montreal Symphony Orchestra – Strauss A Heldemleben – Mahler Rückert songs

ALBUM OF THE YEAR ― MODERN, CONTEMPORARY MUSIC

• Louise Bessette – Anthony Rozankovic: Origami
• David Therrien Brongo – Confluence
• Four Molinari – Glass: Complete String Quartets – String Quartets Nos. 5-7, Vol. 2
• Four Bozzini – Jürg Frey: String Quartet No. 4
• Philip Chiu – Voyages

ALBUM OF THE YEAR ― CURRENT MUSIC, ELECTROACOUSTIC

• Christian Bouchard – IV
• SuperMusic Ensemble – Jean Derome: The warmth of thought
• Léa Boudreau – Limaçon

ALBUM OF THE YEAR ― JAZZ

• Gabriel Genest – As It Is
• Carl Mayotte and musicians – Carnaval
• Productions Marianne Trudel – Marianne Trudel & John Hollenbeck: Dédé Java Espiritu
• Trio Marianne Trudel, Productions Marianne Trudel – Marianne Trudel-Time Poem: The joy of the ephemeral
• SuperNova 4, Production Félix Stüssi – the only one

ALBUM OF THE YEAR ― TRADITIONAL QUEBEC MUSIC

• Nicolas Boulerice, Olivier Demers, Robert Deveaux – Folk art
• Nicolas Boulerice and Frédéric Samson – Cool Trad
• The Smiling Boot – Domino!
• From Time Yesteryear – I hurt my folklore
• Nicolas Pellerin and The Great Howlers – Goal

ALBUM OF THE YEAR ― WORLD MUSIC

• Mikhaëlles Salazar – Women’s path
• Didem Bashar, Patrick Graham, Jean-François Rivers, I Musici de Montréal – Continuum
• Infusion Baroque – East is East
• Mônica Freire, Jean Massicotte, director, author, composer and collaborator – Ilhada
• Airat Ichmouratov, Kleztory – Meeting Point

ALBUM OF THE YEAR ― ANCIENT, CLASSIC, ROMANTIC, MODERN, POSTMODERN IMPULSES

• Louise Bessette, François Dompierre – Tribute to François Dompierre
• Vanessa Marcoux – Ashes
• Cordâme – A woman’s story

ARTICLE OF THE YEAR

• Jimmie LeBlanc – “From sound towards form, meaning…the Other…: spectral thought and engaged art in the mixed works of Serge Provost”
• Laurent Bellemare – « The Shortest Distance between Gamelan and Electronics: Creating a « nexus of understanding » at Martin Bartlett’s Summer Intensives (Vancouver, 1986-1992) »
• Dorian Bandy – « Beethoven’s Rhétoric of Embellishment »
• Danick Trottier and Béatrice Beaudin-Caillé – “Instrumental music produced in Quebec during the 2010s: establishment of a corpus and analysis of the phenomenon”
• David Therrien Brongo – “Micheline Coulombe Saint-Marcoux, pioneer of writing for percussion: around Trakadie (1970)”

SPECIAL PRICES

OPUS MONTRÉAL PRIZE – INCLUSION AND DIVERSITY

• Roozbeh Tabandeh, Ensemble Paramirabo et Chants Libres, Songs of the Drowning – Songs of the Drowning
• Ziya Tabassian and musicians – Concerts Garage
• Elisabeth St-Gelais, soprano – Elisabeth St-Gelais, Nothing will kill my light

OPUS QUÉBEC PRICE

• Quebec Jazz in June
• The Spring of Music

OPUS REGIONS PRICE

• Festival Ripon trad
• Ensemble Scholastica – The song of the bloodlines

COMPOSER, COMPOSER OF THE YEAR

• Marianne Trudel
• Pascal Germain-Berardi
• Sandeep Bhagwati

DISCOVERY OF THE YEAR

• Roozbeh Tabandeh, composer
• Elisabeth St-Gelais, soprano
• David Therrien Brongo, percussionist

SPECIALTY BROADCAST OF THE YEAR

• Historic Chapel of the Good Shepherd
• The Chapel Concerts
• Domaine Forget de Charlevoix

DIRECTOR, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OF THE YEAR

• Nicolas Ellis, Agora Orchestra
• Clemes Schuldt, Quebec Symphony Orchestra
• Thibault Bertin-Maghit, collectif9

MUSICAL EVENT OF THE YEAR

• Agora Orchestra – Earth Gala 2024
• 2024 Piano Edition of the Montreal International Musical Competition
• Temps fort, Forestarem Sixtrum Percussion, Ensemble Horizon, Growler Choir – Basileus

PERFORMER OF THE YEAR

• Vincent Lauzer
• collectif9
• Marianne Trudel

OUTREACH ABROAD

• Alain Bedard
• Quasar four saxophones
• The North Wind