Pianists
Official PianistS
The Official Pianists of the CMIM are collaborative pianists, assigned to play for the competitors of the Voice 2025 edition. These four pianists provide essential musical support and adapt with finesse to the artistic vision and expression of the competitors, to fully support their musical interpretation. Selected for their expertise, the Official Pianists perform with the singers of Voice 2025 for the First Round recitals.
CARSON BECKE
Born and raised in Ottawa, Canadian pianist Carson Becke has performed worldwide. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London, UK, and at the University of Oxford, where he completed a doctorate in musicology. As a chamber musician, Carson enjoys frequent collaborations with sopranos Lavinia Dames and Meghan Lindsay, violinist Carissa Klopoushak, pianist Suren Barry as Duo Octavian, and cellist Julia MacLaine. As an arranger, he written transcriptions of music by Mendelssohn, Puccini, Holst, Richard Strauss, and others. Carson is committed to creating structural changes to the music industry in response to climate change, and the resulting need to create more sustainable systems. He is enacting those ideas through his directorship of the Collines-en-musique, the first classical concert series in Canada with a detailed Green Policy. He lives in Wakefield, Quebec with his family.
MARTIN DUBÉ
After studying piano at the Université Laval and earning a master’s degree in chamber music at McGill University, Martin Dubé continued his training as a vocal coach and collaborative pianist with renowned professor Warren Jones. As a collaborative pianist, coach and harpsichordist, he has performed with the finest voices on the international stage. He has worked at the opera houses of San Diego, Philadelphia, and Quebec City, and has also been vocal coach at the Juilliard School in New York and the Chautauqua Institution School of Music in the United States. He is now principal vocal coach of the Atelier lyrique de l‘Opéra de Montréal. Martin Dubé is one of the most sought-after coaches and pianists specializing in opera for professional singers.
ESTHER GONTHIER
Esther Gonthier holds an esteemed position in the world of vocal arts in Quebec. She regularly works with the Opéra de Montréal, the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, and the Orchestre Métropolitain as pianist-repetiteur, vocal coach, and assistant conductor. She works with voice students at McGill University and the Université de Montréal, as well as with the artists of the Atelier lyrique de l’Opéra de Montréal, with whom she joyfully shares her expertise.
Esther has been an official pianist for the CMIM since its very first edition, dedicated to voice, in 2002. She is also the pianist-repetiteur for the semifinalists and finalists of Voice 2025 for rehearsals with Guest Conductor Patrick Summers.
IAN TINDALE
Ian Tindale is increasingly in demand as a specialist in song repertoire and chamber music. This year, Ian returned to the Ludlow English Song Weekend for a recital with Bethany Horak-Hallett and Dan D’Souza, and in June he joins tenor Nick Pritchard at the Aldeburgh Festival with a program of songs by Benjamin Britten and Imogen Holst. Highlights of the previous season included roles as Official Pianist to both the Wigmore Hall/Bollinger International Song Competition (London, UK) and the International Vocal Competition in ‘s-Hertogenbosch (Netherlands). Ian has previously also been engaged as Official Pianist at the Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels. Other performance highlights include recitals from the Edinburgh Festival and the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and the BBC World Service. His album of Schubert Lieder with regular duo partner Harriet Burns was hailed as ‘a very fine disc indeed’ (Gramophone), and 2025 will see the release of their second album on Delphian Records. Ian is the founding Artistic Director of Shipston Song, a festival in the Cotswolds, UK, and a vocal repertoire and song coach at the Royal College of Music, London.
After having won the hearts of Montrealers during the Voice 2022 edition as collaborative pianist for soprano Harriet Burns, Ian Tindale returns to the CMIM for Voice 2025, this time as an official pianist. Hear Harriet Burns and Ian Tindale and baritone Julien Van Mellaerts in concert on June 1st, 2025, at Salle Bourgie.
