Lavallée’s fa­ther was orig­in­al­ly a wood cut­ter and black­smith, but event­u­al­ly start­ed re­pair­ing mu­sic­al in­stru­ments and teach­ing mu­sic in his lo­cal com­mun­i­ty. Af­ter mov­ing to St. Hy­a­cinthe, Ca­lixa’s fa­ther worked for or­gan build­er Jo­seph Ca­sa­vant. Ca­lixa was play­ing the or­gan by age 11, and at age 13 gave a pi­a­no re­cit­al in the Thé­âtre Roy­al in Mont­ré­al. Ca­lixa la­ter moved to Amer­i­ca, where he a won a com­pe­ti­tion in New Or­leans, Lou­i­si­a­na. As ac­comp­a­nist to Span­ish vi­o­lin­ist Ol­iv­era, he toured Bra­zil and the West In­dies, then re­turned to Amer­i­ca and fought in the Amer­i­can ci­vil war, ris­ing to rank of lieu­ten­ant on the north­ern side. He re­turned to Mont­ré­al af­ter the war, but con­tin­ued to do con­cert tours and teach. The Con­grès Na­tion­al des Ca­na­diens-Fran­çais com­mis­sioned him to com­pose “O Ca­na­da” for St. Jean-Bap­tiste Day in 1880. In 1887, he be­came pre­si­dent of the Mu­sic Teach­ers’ Na­tion­al As­so­ci­a­tion. La­val­lée wrote op­er­et­tas, a sym­ph­ony, and var­i­ous oc­ca­sion­al piec­es and songs.

Sources

Music

1. O Canada