BIOGRAPHY

STUDIES & ORGANIST POSITIONS

The Canadian composer, organist, improviser, teacher and speaker Rachel Laurin (1961-2023) was born in Saint-Benoît, Québec. She received her essential musical and instrumental training at the Montréal Conservatoire of Music (first prize in organ in 1986), and in parallel with her studies at the Conservatoire, she took private composition lessons with Raymond Daveluy.

Upon completion of her studies, she became the organist of the Crypt and assistant to the titular organist of the Saint Joseph’s Oratory (Montréal), a position she held from 1986 to 2002.  She was titular organist at Notre-Dame Cathedral Basilica (Ottawa) from 2002 to 2006, subsequently leaving this position to devote herself fully to concerts, composition, leading master classes, and presenting lectures.

CONCERTS & FESTIVALS

Rachel gave numerous concerts and recitals in Canada and the United States, notably as part of the Concerts Spirituels series presented at Saint Joseph’s Oratory, and at regional and national events organized by the Royal Canadian College of Organists (RCCO) and the American Guild of Organists (AGO). She also performed in several European countries, including France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland.

As part of the 1999 Organ Festival Canada national conference presented by the RCCO in Hamilton (Ontario), she was a soloist with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Boris Brott in Raymond Daveluy’s Concerto for Organ and Orchestra.

In July 2000, Rachel presented Louis Vierne’s Six Symphonies in three recitals on the Beckerath organ of Saint Joseph’s Oratory in Montréal, performances that received public and critical acclaim. One of the few organists to play this complete set of works in concert, she performed it again in 2001 at Notre-Dame Cathedral in Ottawa.

At the inauguration of the Létourneau organ at the Winspear Centre in 2002, she premièred Jacques Hétu’s Concerto for Organ and Orchestra with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra under Mario Bernardi. She reprised this major work at the National Arts Centre (Ottawa) in 2008 with the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra, and in Toronto in 2009 with the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Orchestra.

In addition to her performing activities, she was regularly invited to sit on the jury of organ competitions, including the RCCO National Organ Competition in 2012, and the Canadian International Organ Competition in 2021.

MASTERCLASSES & LECTURES

As an organist-composer, lecturer and teacher, she was a frequent guest at several Canadian and American universities, including Yale University (New Haven, CT), Houston University (Houston, TX), Saint Thomas University (Minneapolis, MN), Baylor University (Waco, TX), Indiana University of Pennsylvania (Indiana, PA), Mount Royal University (Calgary, AB), University of Saint Lawrence (Canton, NY), Kansas City University (MO), and the University of Alberta (Edmonton, AB).

Furthermore, she taught organ improvisation at the Montréal Conservatoire, the École de musique sacrée d’Épinal (France), the Summer Institute of Church Music (Whitby, Ontario), the Summer Academy of the Mount Royal University Conservatory (Calgary, Alberta), as well as in workshops organized by the RCCO and the AGO.

WORKS

Rachel Laurin became an Associate Composer of the Canadian Music Centre in 1989, and served as a “house composer” at Leupold Editions from 2006 until her untimely passing in 2023. Composing almost exclusively on commission, her catalog comprises 112 opus numbers, many of which are sets of pieces or works in several movements. She wrote for solo instruments, chamber music ensembles, orchestra, voice, and choir; more than half of her output is for organ.

Her compositional style is rooted in traditional forms and structures (fugal writing is frequent), in an accessible tonal-modal language, coloured by chromaticism.

Her compositions are published by North American and Australian publishing houses and are regularly performed — notably those for organ — in renowned concert halls and illustrious places of worship at the four corners of the globe.