Skip to content

Mission

Mission

A non-profit organization, Jeunesses Musicales Canada (JMC) has a dual mission: to promote the performance of classical music, especially for young audiences, and to help young professional instrumentalists, singers and composers to develop their careers at the national and international levels.
JMC’s contribution to the Canadian music scene is immense.

Thanks to a network of several hundred volunteers that hosts its touring productions, JMC became one of the first organizations to present professional calibre concerts in outlying regions far from major urban centres. In so doing, since its inception, JMC has presented tens of thousands of concerts to young audiences, families, and the general public from coast to coast across Canada.

Since its foundation, JM Canada has organized concert tours for most of Canada's leading young artists, including well-known names such as Joseph Rouleau, Maureen Forrester, Marek Jablonski, the Orford Quartet, Louis Quilico, James Campbell, André Moisan, Aline Kutan, James Ehnes, Marie-Nicole Lemieux and many others.

History

Click on the timeline to see it full screen

JMC was born on August 23, 1949 following a meeting between Father J.H. Lemieux, Anaïs Allard-Rousseau, and Laurette Desruisseaux-Boisvert, who were brought together in St-Hyacinthe on the initiative of Gilles Lefebvre. Lefebvre suggested linking all the existing societies devoted to cultural activities among young people, and submitted a plan of action calling for concert tours, new lines of administrative co-operation, scholarships, a summer camp, a permanent home, and exchanges between young performers.
 
JMC is affiliated with Jeunesses Musicales International (JMI), considered by UNESCO as the world’s leading cultural organization dedicated to youth and music. JMC is supported by the JMC Foundation as well as the three levels of government. 
 
During a Season, Jeunesses Musicales Canada (JMC) presents some 1,600 concerts and workshops with more than 120 artists, creators and presenters in Québec, Ontario and Maritimes. All in all, the JMC concert tours visit more than 130 Canadian cities in a year. This is why JMC is the most important classical music distributor and producer in Canada, with an annual audience of 130,000 (including 103,000 children ages 3 to 12).

Gilles Lefebvre

“I gave life to the Jeunesses Musicales movement in Canada and the world, first and foremost, to share my true love of a musical genre that needs an initial introduction in order to be fully appreciated, one that requires silence to be heard, one that speaks to the heart and the mind.”

A very charismatic and persuasive figure, Gilles Lefebvre combed the country, recruiting, and founding JMC Centres… He gathered various key players in our society to work towards JMC’s mission: to promote the presentation of classical music, especially to youth, and to support the career development of the finest young professional instrumentalists, singers, and composers, both at home and abroad.

 


 

​* Photos 1960, 1966, 1967, 1970 : BIBLIOTHÈQUE ET ARCHIVES NATIONALES DU QUÉBEC

 


 

Share this page