 Pépin studied with influential Canadian composers Claude Champagne (Montreal) and Arnold Walter (Toronto), and at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia from 1941 to 1944 with Rosario Scalero.He composed music for a film in 1948.In 1949 he won the Quebec government study grant Prix d'Europe as a pianist, which afforded him the opportunity to study several years in Paris (1949-1955).