Joseph Petric
Delivering 'music so diverse, so bold, so alive you're frightened to forget it' (Coda, USA) Mr. Petric's solo career began with an official London debut acclaimed by Independent. His American debut given a citation in “Performances of the Year” by the Washington Post’s Joseph D. McLellan was followed by a trajectory across the Classical concert hall with appearances at Seiji Ozawa Hall, Berlin Philharmonie, Wigmore Hall and Bunkai Kaikan Tokyo. His 360 confirmed commissions enjoyed deep connection with audiences and media critics, a curatorial initiative well in tune with the artistic stewardship of the Arditti Quartet and the American Wind Symphony.
Mr. Petric began his concerto-led career with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra under Jukka Pekka Saraste, followed by a historic performance of three concertos in one evening with the Victoria Symphony Orchestra. His discography includes 42 Cd titles on 17 labels and 59 recordings for international state radio systems. His collaborators include Pauline Oliveros, Witold Lutoslawski, John Cage, David Tudor, IRCAM, the Canadian Electronic Ensemble the Penderecki Quartet, Christoph Pregardien and Pentaedre. His festival appearances include Tokyo Spring, Tangelwood Festival, London Southbank, IRCAM Agora, Hohenems Schubertide, Huddersfield and Montreal's MnM Festival. He is a frequent concerto soloist with the Societe de Musique Contemporaine de Quebec and Montreal's Nouvel Ensemble Moderne.
Mr Petric's publications reconstruct an emergent accordion epistemology unprecedented in the literature, with his retrieval of Giovanni Gagliardi’s forgotten 1911 treatise Manualetto del Fisharmonicista, the first confirmation of the origins of the concert accordion in the literature, and the pattern archaeology of more than 54 forgotten period instruments and patents 1900-40. He was Invited to a professorship by the Université de Montréal (Québec) where he mentors the Faculté de Musique graduate performance department.
Mr. Petric plays a bespoke instrument modelled on the 1910 Camerano built Leo Niemi, 1996, Sudbury, Ontario. His masters were Hugo Noth and Colin Tilney.
He lives in Upper Canada, Montreal and the old Ionian coast.
NEWS - HUGO NOTH OBITUARY
In Memoriam ©
Hugo Noth born March 3, 1943 Fribourg, Switzerland
died 11 May 2026 Vaterstetten, Germany.
Hugo Noth began his formal studies in Trossingen, Germany 1964 with Fritz Dobler (1928-2025). In so doing he joined a lineage of interpreters reaching back to the 1920s that included Ernst Schittenhelm, Hugo Hermann, Dietmar Walther and Lydia Braun. Mentored by Dobler between 1964-72, Noth perfected his art in Trossingen’s rigourous curriculum established 1946 studying figured bass, improvisation in traditional harmony, composition and palimpsest. After perfecting his interpretive studies with Fritz Dobler, Noth studied composition with Bernhard Rovenstrunck and Jaime Padros 1968-77. A legendary collaborator his contributions to the canon included 140 commissions, his own compositions, new musicology, and dozens of palimpsests of works by J.P. Rameau, J.S.Bach, George Friedrich Handel, Domenico Scarlatti, Mussorsky's Pictures at and Exhibition and titles from the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book. His stewardship created Trossingen's BARCH manuscript archive for accordion works.
While studying in Trossingen Noth and his contemporaries Gérard Grisey and Gisela Walther inspired composer Wolfgang Jacobi to write a collection of finely wrought neo-classical works in the 1960s. Published as the Divertissement and Preissler series, most works in the collection were written for and dedicated to Noth. These collaborations with Jacobi and the acclaimed performances of all three seasoned artists by European media was confirmation of a German interpretive school reaching back to the 1920s. The art was codified by Irma Slota-Kreig’s 1954 Neue Schule für Akkordeon (Hohner AG), Hugo Noth its leading international advocate.
Between 1972-2013 Noth led the accordion class at Trossingen’s Hochschüle für Musik and was an active member of the Paris based Ensemble l’Itinéraire. A dedicated teacher he gave masterclasses across Europe, the USA, Canada, Russia and South America. But his greatest legacy was his infusive interpretive power on the concert stage that electrified international audiences and media critics. Using Slota-Krieg’s sound production concepts as a start point Noth developed his performance practice with detailed studies of anatomy and neurology. His comprehensive approach of interpretive gestalt underlined his distinctive 1980s shift toward thematic recitals devoted entirely to Scarlatti sonatas presented in Moscow and Switzerland. Noth's thematic programing was unprecedented by an accordionist for the period although period keyboardists Ralph Kirkpatrick (USA), Kenneth Gilbert (Québec, Belgium), Scott Ross (Québec) and Colin Tilney (Canada) had been programing such recitals since the 1950s. In so doing Hugo Noth's fresh perspectives of 'inscribed translations' of Scarlatti was no inconsequential development, appearing decades before the post-critical art was codified as Classical adaptation theory by Lawrence Venuti (USA) and Linda Hutcheon (Canada). Few noticed.
Hugo Noth gave his Canadian debut recital the week of November 17, 1975 at Toronto's Ettore Mazzoleni Concert Hall. In a debut recital where standing room only was the order of the day with members of the Toronto Symphony, chamber artists, university academics, CBC radio personalities, composers, media critics, University of Toronto accordion students and a goodly number of genuinely intrigued members of the general public in attendance, Noth performed Grisey’s Passacaille, Jacobi’s Franzosisches Ouverture, Rameau’s Pieces de Claveçin 1704, and Mozart’s Andante für Mechanische Orgel. Noth's performance stunned the house into silence, and the audience, as the last cadence died away gasped and leapt to its feet as if guided by some silent hand in a loud and prolonged standing ovation. Music critic William Littler writing for the Toronto Star cited Hugo's performance for its ‘...silvery technique...informed musicianship and sense of style...his accordion sounding at times with the brilliance of a harpsichord…’
He was only 32 years old.
Leb wohl, Meister, Du hast viele Geschenke hinterlassen.
Joseph Petric
Upper Canada.
20.06.2026
© All rights reserved. This obituary, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.
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NEW RELEASE - Accordion Dialogues and the Poetics of an Interpretive Art Augemus Press, Essen, Germany. available at www.Augemus.de
RECORDINGs UPCOMING - Iberian sonatas by Casanovas, Galles, Albeniz, Soler and Scarlatti, ASTRILA label.
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Lutosławski – Dance Preludes (1954)
Joseph Petric gratefully acknowledges the generous support of:
...External Affairs Canada, The Svenska Reikskonzerter and the late Toronto philanthropist Roger Moore.