I imagine if Julian Armour‘s life wasn’t wrapped around music, he may have been a high-tech entrepreneur, or perhaps a poker player. He works hard at reading people and situations, he’s willing to gamble with his own money and when he gets cold-cocked from behind, he gets right back up swinging.

A Natural-Born Scavenger. Photo by Mike Levin.

With one week to go before Armour debuts a new classical music festival in Ottawa – Music and Beyond – he has finally triumphed in a recent tussle with pneumonia, 10 pounds lighter and wondering if the photographs I’m taking will make him look like someone out of GQ magazine. He’s definitely in fighting shape, but he has to be with 10 days of performances upcoming under his administrative baton, including four concerts in which he will play his beloved cello. His wife, the violist Guylaine Lemaire, will perform in three and then rest a few weeks before delivering the couple’s second child.

Armour says he’s used to this kind of pressure, something he’s been doing since 1994 when he founded Ottawa’s Chamberfest (leaving the organization in 2007). There’s not a whiff of the nervousness that lies like a scowl on most people who are about to insert a high-profile festival into an already packed summer music schedule. “People would come up to me in Loblaws and ask when I was going to put on more classical music. Ottawa has fantastic music lovers, and (advance ticket sales) indicate to me that (Music and Beyond) is needed,” he says.

That’s the accountant speaking, something that started with the economics he studied in university and apprenticed at through half a dozen arts administrator jobs, where selling every ticket and attracting every sponsor was “like drawing blood. I am a natural-born scavenger; this helps.” 

But it is music that sends Armour off in search of purpose, knowing that connecting it to humans can create alchemy. This was cemented a few years back when he watched his father climb out of a hospital bed to attend a concert. “It fills in the blanks when people are looking for contact, for signs of humanity.”

This is why Armour ransacked his Rolodex to assemble a world-class lineup for Music and Beyond and then begged, borrowed or stole whatever was needed to make the event more accessible. “People today are looking for artistic experiences, and an arts organization’s main purpose is to make people feel comfortable in that experience. Some in classical music love the elitist feeling, and that’s the worst thing for the art world.” He’s speaking in much broader terms than just music.

Today, just recovered from a serious illness, with the biggest risk of his life around the corner, Armour sits babysitting his son and musing about what a second child in the house will be like. His context of life has changed and with it the meaning of risk and reward.

Ten years ago he was selected for the Victor Tolgesy Award, for contributions to Ottawa’s cultural creativity, and the feeling was marvelous. His view has changed slightly: “We glow at awards, and then forget (what they really mean). It frustrates me because we know the economic return (of a vibrant arts sector) and the private-sector benefits. There is a responsibility to give back, to keep Ottawa a safe, clean, beautiful place to live. But this is a responsibility that’s not being met.”

Armour sours at the thought of that unmet obligation. “I feel the private sector needs to do a whole lot more than what they are doing,” he says. But the moment passes; he’s got a show to put on, and the only attitude he can afford to be concerned with is how people will react to a music festival that spills into literature, poetry, dance and film.

A full preview of the July 5 – 14 Music and Beyond will be posted July 2 on UnFolding.