Félix Leclerc : TV Mini-Series, Radio-Canada, 2005

The 4-part mini-series Félix Leclerc*, was met with a complicated critical and public response and ignited passions all the way to a lawsuit upon its release in 2005, but over the years it has attained a surprising longevity of a fan cult classic due to the participation of enormously popular Daniel Lavoie**, who seems to be having the last laugh in this story.

La Fête Nationale du Québec on the Plains of Abraham (June 23, 2018) : a foreigner's experience

If you ever find yourself in Quebec city on June 23 in the evening, do what the locals do: go see the free open air show in the city’s Plains of Abraham park on the high shore of the Saint-Lawrence river, because it’s the national holiday and the show is grand.

J’écoute la radio : notes on Daniel Lavoie's concert tour (2012-2014)

©Spectra Musique

 

To see a big picture one needs to step away from it. In order to understand the role a concert tour played in a performer’s carrier one needs to wait a couple of years after the tour’s ended. So, what exactly was the J’écoute la radio tour? Now, 3.5 years later is the best time to answer the question.

Daniel Lavoie and I Musici de Montréal, Laurentian Highlands Festival of Classical Music, August 14, 2010.

Once upon a time (in August 2010 to be exact) the village of Ferme-Neuve in the Laurentian Highlands region of Quebec hosted an exclusive concert that brought together Daniel Lavoie and I Musici de Montréal.

Marjo et ses hommes, Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu (Quebec), August 15, 2010

© Marjo et ses hommes

Once again, summer rains have brought memories of the show Marjo and her men (Marjo et ses hommes), seen in August 2010 at the 27th International Baloon Festival (International de montgolfières) in the good town of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu in Quebec... Time to write these memories down.

Mes longs voyages (show) : Daniel Lavoie's live show, Canada, February 2017

If you go see Daniel Lavoie's new live show Mes longs voyages and are familiar with his eponymous and unabashedly dark album (released in 2016), you are in for a surprise. Because oh, what a magician that Daniel Lavoie is! Hop-la and all the blood, sweat and tears of the album turn into champagne! Effervescent and luminous, Daniel Lavoie sings, dances, switches (or ditches) instruments, talks, laughs, grimaces, savors his time in the limelight, as if trying to put behind him all the troubles that followed him in 2016 (and inspired the album) as fast as he can, and he effortlessly pulls the audience into his happy vortex. And as for that guy on the promo photos - the one who carries the weight of the world on his shoulders – one wonders what he has to do with this show…

Mes longs voyages (album) / Daniel Lavoie (2016, Spectra Musique)

By now I have listened to Daniel Lavoie’s new album Mes longs voyages (MLV) many times, and have found that it not only offers the listener some truly beautiful music, but is at the same time a poetic and philosophical statement of striking sincerity and poignancy. Clearly designed as an attempt to draw up a "balance sheet" of life's journey, it exposes the idea of finality and acceptance while at the same time offering a true declaration of love for fragile human beings and for life itself.

William Blake's Songs of Experience, an album by Laurent Guardo, 2011.

 

Here are a few words about Laurent Guardo's early album "William Blake's Songs of Experience". Curiously labeled anything from "lounge" to "international" and even "Broadway" (I am looking at you, Amazon.com), to me this album's music sounds more like modern jazz with strong ambience and psychedelic overtones, although perhaps it's simply difficult to categorize precisely. This is a meditative music, but depending on the mode d'emploi it can make a very different impact on the listener. If one puts earbuds on and surrenders to the album completely, this music is likely to overpower one's reality and take one with it to its own philosophical space, which begins with Blake's great poetry and stretches to the depths of the listener's own mind. However, when enjoyed in a company of friends it makes a great background music for a quiet conversation about life...

Les filles de Caleb: a few words in honor of a Québec musical

Image source: http://www.tandem.mu/photos/artistes/bannieres/fillesdecaleb2.jpg

This is a nostalgic post remembering an original musical Les filles de Caleb that we saw in 2011 at the Grand Théâtre de Québec.

Prélude aux 12 hommes (Théâtre de Quat’Sous, Montreal, November 9, 2015) : Gilles Bélanger and special guest Daniel Lavoie

In tiny and totally charming Montreal's Théâtre de Quat’Sous (a perfect venue for an intimate show) Gilles Bélanger, the composer behind the legendary "Douze hommes rapaillés" project, invites one of the 12 "hommes" (participants of that project) every evening over the course of two weeks this November for a conversation about the "Douze hommes", music, songwriting and personal paths in the music business. I saw the show on November 9 when Daniel Lavoie visited the stage.

Daniel Lavoie sings Gaston Miron : a note from the audence

A photo from Douze hommes rapaillés, most likely taken in the Parc de la Francophonie in Quebec City on July 11, 2011. The original source of the photo is unknown. Immediate source: http://www.daniellavoie.ru/dl/index.php/en/creativework/concerts/440--2011

A few years ago  I had a chance to see one of a handful of live performances of the legendary Douze hommes rapaillés, the one that took place in in the Parc de la Francophonie in Quebec City on July 11, 2011. (For the details, see my earlier post). The 12 extraordinary French-Canadian singer/songwriters/poets/political activists and just plain handsome men were creating an enormous energy on that open air stage and beyond. But this post is about Daniel Lavoie.

Douze hommes rapaillés : an outsider's view. (Quebec City, July 11, 2011 Festival d'été de Québec)

Photo credit: Agence Spectra

One goes to a lot of shows during lifetime, but some stay in memory in every detail, years later, as if you saw them yesterday. Douze hommes rapaillés at the Québec City Summer Festival in 2011 became one of those shows for me, although, curiously enough I was by no means the target audience for it (not being French-Canadian).  

La licorne captive live at Festival Classica, May 29 2015, Saint-Lambert (Quebec)

 

Daniel Lavoie sings La Licorne Captive, Festival Classica, St-Lambert, May 29 2015

La licorne captive at the Festival Classica in St-Lambert on May 29 was an event as beautiful as it was rare. After all that was indeed the only chance to date to see this show in North America (the Europeans had already had several opportunities to see it in France). I've been under the spell of the original album (Le chant du monde, 2014) for over a year now (here is why), and finally the fortune smiled on me, so last Friday I found myself inside a very full house in the Catholic Church of St-Lambert, located on one of the quiet streets of this nice suburb of Montreal. Voilà, La licorne captive in Quebec.

La Licorne Captive - Un projet musical de Laurent Guardo / Daniel Lavoie (2014, Chant du Monde)

[For an audience video from the official album presentation skip to Bonus 1].

La Licorne Captive (The CaptiveUnicorn) is an album that's sensual and darkly beautiful, with haunting melodies, and even more haunting poetic images. Its musical energy is quite strong, it sucks you in, takes you on a Dantean journey (or a sexy horror movie trip), throws you into catharsis, cures you with images of purity and love, and at the end leaves you with a poignant feeling which remains with you and is most beautiful.

Comédies Humaines / Daniel Lavoie (2007, GSI Canada)

Comédies Humaines is one of my favorite albums by Daniel Lavoie. No-no, one doesn't need to understand French in order to appreciate it. The music is enough, with its sensual and at the same time intellectual allure. However, as always the case with this author/singer, words matter, and they matter a lot.