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| City Guide - Quebec City - Culture | ||
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Culture Cultural Events: Quebec City's cultural scene runs the gamut from the high aspects of opera and symphony to intimate boites à chansons, with their Celtic-tinged Québécois folk music. While there is some experimental theatre - boosted by local son Robert Lepage - much of the theatre tends towards the mainstream, with larger performances often light-hearted musicals. Film is primarily in French, but there are usually at least a couple of screens showing English-language flicks at any given time. The best way to appreciate the culture, though, is during one of the large festivals, in which almost the whole city seems to become involved. Québec Sur Scène (web site: www.surscene.qc.ca) has information on dance, theatre, classical music and other shows. Tickets for many events are available from Réseau Billetech (tel: (418) 643 8131 or 691 7211; web site: www.billetech.com) and Admission (tel: (800) 361 4595; web site: www.admission.com), as well as the venues themselves. Music: The city's main symphony orchestra, the Orchestre symphonique de Québec (tel: (418) 643 5598 or 643 8486 (bookings); web site: www.osq.qc.ca), performs at Quebec City's most prestigious venue, Le Grand Théâtre du Québec, 269 boulevard René-Lévesque Est (web site: www.grandtheatre.qc.ca). The Grand Théâtre is also the home of the Opéra de Québec (tel: (418) 529 4142; web site: www.operadequebec.qc.ca) and features performances by visiting soloists and orchestras organised by the Club Musical de Québec music society. The chamber orchestra, Les Violons du Roy (web site: www.violonsduroy.com) perform at the Palais Montcalm on Place D'Youville when they take a break from their hectic touring schedule. Many of Quebec City's churches provide a wonderful ambience for classical concerts - Chalmers-Wesley United Church, 78 rue Ste-Ursule, has organ concerts on Sunday at 1800 during the summer, while the chapel in the Musée de l'Amérique française has daytime concerts. In summer, music moves out of doors, with classical concerts at the Kiosque Edwin-Bélanger bandstand (tel: (418) 648 4050; web site: www.surscene.qc.ca) on the Plains of Abraham, as well as occasional concerts at the open-air Agora, 120 rue Dalhousie (tel: (418) 692 4672) in the Old Port. Further afield, Domaine Forget (tel: (418) 452 3535 or (888) 336 7438; web site: www.domaineforget.com), 140km (87 miles) east of Quebec City in Ste-Irénée (near La Malbaie in Charlevoix), is renowned for its summer concert series. Theatre: The Grand Théâtre de Québec, 269 boulevard René-Lévesque Est (web site: www.grandtheatre.qc.ca) hosts some of the city's larger theatre productions, in addition to concerts. The resident company is the three-decade old Le Théâtre du Trident (tel: (418) 643 5873; web site: www.letrident.com), that performs modern French works and translation of American and European plays. Le Capitole de Québec, 972 rue St-Jean (tel: (418) 694 4444 or (800) 261 9903; web site: www.lecapitole.com), has dinner theatre performances and a smaller cabaret venue. Théâtre de la Bordée, 1143 rue St-Jean (tel: (418) 694 9721 or 9631 (bookings); web site: www.bordee.qc.ca), has a contemporary, often cutting-edge, programme. They will be moving to new premises after the 2000/01 season has finished. Dance: There are no major permanent dance companies in the city. La Rotonde, 310 boulevard Langelier (tel: (418 694 9721; web site: www.larotonde.qc.ca), produces shows by touring and local contemporary dance companies, although only some performances take place at the actual venue. Film: Most films are screened in French, although at the beginning of a film's run the original English version (v.o.a.) may be available in the suburban multiplexes, especially in Ste-Foy. The main repertory house, Cinéma le Clap, 2360 chemin Ste-Foy (tel: (418) 650 2527; web site: www.clap.qc.ca), also has occasional English-language offerings. The weekly Voir is the best source for listings. The 1991 film Robe Noire (Black Robe) captured the life of seventeenth-century New France, with a young Jesuit priest departing early Quebec City with his Algonquin guides to visit a remote mission. Filming took place near La Baie, two and a half hours' drive away; the set has been converted into a tourist attraction: Site de la Nouvelle-France, du Vieux chemin, Saint-Félix-d'Otis (tel: (418) 544 8027; web site: www.royaume.com/nouvelle-france). Le Confessional (1995), directed by renowned theatre director Robert Lepage, jumps back and forth between present day Quebec City and 1952, during the time that Alfred Hitchcock filmed I Confess (released in 1953). Cultural events: Three festivals dominate the Quebec City calendar, including the Carnaval de Québec (tel: (418) 626 3716; web site: www.carnaval.qc.ca), famous for its mascot, Bonhomme Carnaval. The two-week winter carnival has long been a boozy favourite - necessary to ward off the February cold, of course - although organisers are trying to change the focus to a more family-orientated atmosphere. All sorts of winter activities from building ice castles to tobogganing and ice skating are on offer. In early July, the 11-day Festival d'Été (Summer Festival) (tel: (418) 529 5200 or (888) 992 5200; web site: www.infofestival.com) transforms the whole of the city centre into a stage, with a full schedule of over 500 concerts including classical music, opera, Québécois rock and techno sets. The following month, Les Fêtes de la Nouvelle-France (tel: (418) 694 3311; web site: www.nouvellefrance.qc.ca) takes participants back to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries before the British conquest. Visitors from around the province dress in period costume to partake in events in Lower Town, whose perfect setting is enlivened by open-air markets, entertainers and typical activities of the time. Literary Notes Other than journals of the early explorers, such as Samuel de Champlain, the first literature out of Quebec City was François-Xavier Garneau's Histoire du Canada (1845-48). The life and habits of late eighteenth-century Québécois were captured in Philippe Aubert de Gaspé's Les Anciens Canadiens (1863), a name that is now used by the restaurant that occupies the 1677 Maison Jacquet, 34 rue St-Louis, where he lived. Anne Hébert, the novelist and poet born in Ste-Catherine-de-la-Jacques-Cartier, a village west of the city, wrote Kamouraska (1974), based on a real-life love-triangle and murder in the 1840s in the eponymous town on the south shore of the St Lawrence, east of Quebec City. Jacques Poulin, known for The 'Jimmy' Trilogy of novels (1967-70) studied at Université Laval, as did Antonine Maillet, whose Pélagie-la Charette (1979) won the Prix Goncourt, France's top literary prize. |
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