COMPOSERS IN PLAY XIV: paraphrases for a New World at Tenri Cultural Institute

On the heels of Canadian Opera Company's brilliant new commission, French-Canadian composer Julien Bilodeau joins the Piano Lunaire mainstage for two American premieres.

The knack for story-telling that Quebec composer Julien Bilodeau commands is on full display in his piano music, just as much as in his operatic works. A master of pacing and colour, Bilodeau also wields a prodigious dexterity of dimensionality and emotional sincerity in his music. The intimacy and impact of his piano music is gazed through two premieres on this programme: the four Spring Études, composed in 2011 before the composition of Bilodeau's first piano concerto, revised in 2024, and Six Paraphrases on La Reine-garçon (2025), written especially for Adam Sherkin and given its US premiere.

From Bilodeau: “Through these paraphrases, the listener will be transported on a condensed journey that recounts the highlights of the opera while being able to appreciate a mode of pianistic writing that is both virtuoso and poetic.”