DONATE
Copied to clipboard

Background

The Orchestre symphonique de Montréal Chorus was established in the 1980s at the request of Charles Dutoit. Composed of 50 professional singers and 80 to 100 volunteer singers, the Chorus has joined forces with the OSM for hundreds of performances of masterworks from the repertoire.

The OSM Chorus has been heard in Montréal, Toronto, Ottawa, New York, Philadelphia and Saratoga Springs in works as diverse as Handel’s Messiah, Bach’s Mass in B Minor, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Verdi’s Requiem, Mahler’s Resurrection Symphony, Shostakovich’s Babi Yar Symphony and Dallapiccola’s Il Prigionero. In addition to singing under the direction of Rafael PayareKent Nagano and Charles Dutoit, the OSM Chorus has collaborated with such guest conductors as Nicholas McGegan, Zubin Mehta, Krzysztof Penderecki, Robert Shaw, Iwan Edwards (its director for some 20 years) and Andrew Megill, chorus master since 2011.

Recordings and distinctions

Among the many OSM recordings on which the OSM Chorus can be heard, noteworthy are Berlioz’s Les Troyens, which was honored with a Grammy Award in 1996, and Holst’s The Planets, which received the Grand Prix du disque – Canada in 1988.