Originally from Montréal and working in Atlantic Canada since 1980, Michel Cardin has gained international recognition as a teacher, a performer, a musicologist and a producer. He is currently full professor of guitar and lute at the Department of Music of the University of Moncton (Canada), with a PhD equivalence status, and has made 13 compact discs of solo Baroque lute music and duos with flute. These recordings, consisting for the most part of world premieres, are dedicated to The London Manuscript by Silvius Leopold Weiss (1687-1750), the undisputed master of the instrument. Michel Cardin has given concerts, conferences and masterclasses in the Americas, Europe, Japan and Africa. He started 2009 the La Tour Baroque Duo with Tim Blackmore on harpsichord and recorder. The Duo plays regularly throughout Canada, Europe and the USA and has made three CDs so far.

The critic of a Tunis newspaper wrote, “Michel Cardin gave us an evening of high artistic and cultural interest, proposing music of extreme refinement, of the 17th and 18th centuries by German, French and English composers for Baroque lute. All welcome and appreciated were the manner M.Cardin presented the instrument and his way of performing the works, which he loves without a doubt deeply. This concert was also the occasion to admire his virtuosity full of delicacy, even almost caresses, with which the artist plucked the strings. Truly, I think that those present were little prepared to listen to the proposed repertoire, and we feel a great gratitude for his message of discovery, which constitutes a precious enrichment of our cultural heritage. Our applauses are already an eloquent testimony.”
(Daniele Passalacqua, “Il Corriere di Tunisi” Corriere Euromediterraneo – N° 51,5 November 2008)

In 1977, he obtained a ‘First prize’ top diploma from the Montreal Conservatory in guitar performance and counterpoint, plus diplomas in harmony and solfège. His list of teachers for interpretation is impressive, with Stephen Fentok, Alexandre Lagoya, Alirio Diaz, Alberto Ponce, John Mills, Oscar Ghiglia for guitar and Toyohiko Satoh, Patrick O’Brien, Nigel North, Robert Barto, Jakob Lindberg, William Christie (at the Paris Conservatory) for instruction in lute and continuo on theorbo. He was a soloist with Symphony Nova Scotia. As a theorbist, he performed under William Christie, Andrew Parrott and Christian Mendoze, in addition to the Louisbourg Choir and the Musica Divina, Les Idées Heureuses and Réjouissance ensembles. He also founded the Ensemble Baroque Montéclair in 1990.

Along with radio and television national appearances (“Les beaux Dimanches”, etc.) he has at the same time taken part in important shows in Atlantic Canada, such as the concerts for the Bicentennial of New-Brunswick, the Acadian World Congress and the International Francophony Summit, as well as the Éloizes and East Coast Music Awards shows. Michel Cardin has received fifteen nominations, including the ADISQ, and six awards at events of this kind, and have been among the Discs of the Week and the Best buys of the Year on CBC-FM. Rick Phillips’s Sound Advice program gave them a ‘5 stars out of 5’, and Vol. 1 took second position in the international “Top Ten” classical albums of the year (orchestras & soloists) in the Montreal Voir magazine,1994. The London Manuscript-Vol.5 won Quebec’s Music Council’s OPUS award 1998 for Best classical album of the year. M. Cardin was awarded the Geocities Vienna 2000 Award for outstanding artistic merit for the new millennium, the Éloize 2001 and 2010 Awards for best international exposure outside Atlantic Canada, two Étoiles Awards (classical artist and album of the year), and has received the Excellence in Music Award from the Government of New-Brunswick. His CDs are among the most regularly played by the Canadian FM stations and are part of special programs in various countries like Germany, where it has been said in 2009 :

“If we compare the Cardin Weiss CDs to others, we could say this is like comparing a vintage wine to some diesel for tramps.”(as reported on http://www.tamino-klassikforum.at/thread.php?threadid=9776)
His CDs get high praise (4 stars) in respected international magazines as Fanfare, Diapason, Le Monde de la Musique, Goldberg, etc. The prestigious British Early Music magazine begins its August 2009 extensive review of the Cardin/Weiss recording by “Discussions of Weiss recordings in recent issues of this journal made no mention of the most remarkable project of all, (by) the French-Canadian lutenist Michel Cardin”. Classical Guitar Magazine claimed in 2005 : “Let’s raise our glasses to this prince of the lute of the 21st century, Michel Cardin.” Michel Cardin has also premiered new pieces dedicated to him, for the lute and for the guitar, one of which was on the 1986 recording of the Atlantic Canadian Composers’ Association. In 1991 he played the guitar part in Le Marteau sans maître under the direction of Pierre Boulez at the Scotia Festival. As a composer he has written various works for films, radio, etc. Michel Cardin is also as a recording producer and has published regular musicological articles (in 6 different languages so far) in European, American and Asian periodicals. In addition he published an Oratorio by Marc-Antoine Charpentier, and solos and duos by Weiss with his own reconstructions. A Silver Medalist of the Royal Society of the Arts, he was a jury member for the Canada and the New-Brunswick Councils, the Quebec Council Opus Prizes Gala and the Quebec Funds for Research and Culture.

Cardin, Étude No. 1

Cardin, Étude No. 1

Michel Cardin, Étude No. 1