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The Canadian harpsichordist, organist, musicologist, teacher, Kenneth, Gilbet, studied with Conrad Letendre (organ) and, at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec, with Yvonne Hubert (piano) and Gabriel Cusson (harmony and counterpoint). Gilbert won the 1953 Prix d'Europe for organ and studied for two years in Europe with Nadia Boulanger (composition), Gaston Litaize and Maurice Duruflé (organ), and Sylvie Spicket (harpsichord). His harpsichord teacher in France was Italian-born Wanda Landowska protégé Ruggero Gerlin. Though he was on leave in 1953-1955 for these studies, he remained officially the organist and music director from 1952 to 1967 at Queen Mary Road United Church (now Rosedale Queen Mary United Church) in Montreal. In 1955 he gave a recital of Canadian organ music for the RTF (Radio France). Back in Canada he designed and in 1959 supervised the installation at Queen Mary Road of the first major modern tracker organ in Canada. This instrument (built by R. von Beckerath of Hamburg) and Gilbert's performances on it strongly influenced subsequent organ building practice in Canada. The society Ars Organi, in the formation of which Gilbert played a leading role, also influenced organ performance standards in eastern Canada.
While in Paris (1965) on a Québec government grant, doing research on François Couperin in preparation for a CBC series (and subsequent RCI recording) of the composer's complete works for harpsichord, Kenneth Gilbert suggested that a new edition would be appropriate to honour the F. Couperin tercentenary (1968). Heugel agreed to publish Gilbert's four volumes of the edition as part of its early-music series, Le Pupitre (1969-1972). This edition excited much admiration for its scholarly approach, posited on a scrupulous re-examination of the original engraved scores. Following the international success of the Couperin edition, Gilbert began the monumental task of preparing a new edition (from existing editions) of the 555 sonatas of Domenico Scarlatti. 11 volumes were published by Heugel (1971-1984). The research was subsidized in part by the Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon and the Canada Council. Gilbert also prepared a fasimile edition of the complete harpsichord works of F. Couperin (Broude 1973) and edited the complete harpsichord works of Jean-Henri d'Anglebert (Heugel 1975). Moreover, he prepared new editions of J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations (BWV 988) (Salabert 1979), Girolamo Frescobaldi's first and second books of toccatas (Zanibon 1979, 1980) and Rameau's complete harpsichord works (Heugel 1979). In 1980, he began to prepare a re-issue of F. Couperin's complete works for L'Oiseau-Lyre (Monaco). With Élizabeth Gallat-Morin, he produced a annotated edition of the Livre d'orgue de Montréal published in three volumes at the Éditions Jacques Ostiguy (1985, 1987, 1988).
Reflecting his editorial interests, Kenneth Gilbert's performance after 1965 was devoted almost completely to harpsichord playing. In 1968, he gave his first recital in London and undertook an international career. He became widely admired for his concerts, broadcasts, and recordings. Stephen Plaistow in Gramophone (May 1973) said: 'Kenneth Gilbert's achievement... is to rescue the music from a small circle of connoisseurs and to make it... universally enjoyable. He does so by harnessing the discipline of scholarship to his flair for performing the music... Not since Thurston Dart... has there been such a fruitful coincidence of the scholar's mind and the performer's fingers in this field'. He was a soloist several times with the Chicago Symphony Chorus and performed with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, National Arts Centre Orchestra, and Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. In 1967, with Robert Koff in Montreal, he played all the J.S. Bach violin and harpsichord sonatas. A resident of France in the 1970's, he gave recitals there (and in Germany, England, and Switzerland) and a series of joint recitals with the violinist Robert Kohnen for Radio France.
Kennet Gilbert taught from 1957 to 1974 at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec; from 1964 to 1972 at McGill University (Honoraru D MUS in 1981); from 1969 to 1976 at Laval University, and, as guest professor; from 1971 to 1974 at the Royal Flemish Cons in Antwerp. He gave master-classes in several European cities in many universities in the USA including Berkeley, Michigan, Florida and Birmingham. In 1988, he began to teach at the Mozarteum in Salzburg. That year, he became professor of harpsichord at the Cons de Paris, the first Canadian to hold such a post. Each summer, he is a guest professor at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena, Italy. He was artist-in-residence 1969-1970 at the University of Ottawa and also taught summer courses at the Vleeshuis museum in Antwerp from 1971 to 1982 and in Haarlem, Holland (from 1973). His pupils have included Hubert Bédard, Martha Brickman, Hélène Dugal, John Grew, Martha Hagen, Jos van Immerseel, Hwaeja Lee, Lucien Poirier, Réjean Poirier, Wayne Riddell, Scott Ross, and John Whitelaw. Gilbert was a judge in 1975 for the Concours international de clavecin, Paris, and in 1978 for the CBC Talent Festival, Ottawa. The Canadian Music Council named him Artist of the Year in 1978. He received the Prix de musique Calixa-Lavallée 1981. In 1986, he was named officer of the Order of Canada, and in 1988 was elected to the Royal Society of Canada. He is an honorary member of the Royal Academy of Music, and Officier de l'Ordre des arts et lettres de France.
Kenneth Gilbert entwined scholarship and performance more closely than almost any other figure in the field of early music, making scholarship an art and performance a means of investigation. He made well over 50 recordings. His recordings have been released on the Harmonia Mundi and Archiv labels, as well as a host of more specialized lines. He focused on French music, and his recordings of works such as the Premier livre de clavecin by Chambonnières are considered standards. But he also made major J.S. Bach recordings, including, for example, a 1989 Archiv release on which he performed the Art of the Fugue (BWV 1080). |
