In person. No intermediary, no screen, nothing to “zoom in” since we are life-size. On the spot. His home. “Real people asking real questions and listening to real answers!” »Exclaims Gilles Vigneault, delighted. We cannot touch each other to check, sanitary instructions oblige, but the moment is no less palpable.
Density of bodies, things and words. Consistency of life. It’s how he sings it in “ Language my sweet country ”, one of the ten new arias from his brand new album, entitled Like a love song (eleven, if we count the tale in the middle: JOREA, a fact of spring). “I am the age of the word season / I live in the word house / I am aging in the word week / Passenger in the word path”, he offers. Three-dimensional worms. Do the math.
Let’s measure. Time confined, time lost, time spent. The last time, Vigneault in his checked jacket from Vigneault had walked up rue Sauvé, trotting briskly to make up for his (small) delay. He could be seen from the corner of René-Lévesque (the main one, in St-Placide), from the large balcony of the old store which he used for everything he needed for the word and music trades: rehearsal room, professional meeting room , warehouse, archive center. This time, Suzanne Beaucaire from Le Nordet publishes it in Communauto, at the door. This is the only concession he makes to his very gallant 93 years: a little extra caution. To tell the truth, we are cautious for him, since he is not too cautious for himself.
We can’t wait to talk to each other
He is very anxious to converse, the roadblock leaks, will give way. Speech, words, language are for him air, water, fire, wind and light. “Langage is a nomadic and sedentary country! »He writes in Like a prologue, its entry before the first new song on the disc. “If you recognize them, if these words are yours / they are your passport… this country belongs to you!” “
Who are these words for? Whose country? Are we still proud of our language of Quebec? Who still hears Vigneault’s words? What does Vigneault say to the children of this XXI?e century in such a hurry to do battle and end it? “I tell them: learn Quebec by heart. You have the language, you sometimes have two, it is very very precious. In the word “learn” there is the word “take”. To learn your language well is to take the country. It’s like in the expression: take charge. Learn as much as possible about Quebec. Become experts in Quebec, a country that exists before it existed, and which deserves to be made to exist. “
It is by words, by knowledge, that one can overcome what he calls “the old human fear” of the stranger: the real danger is to believe oneself firmly standing on “quicksand”, in which we can only sink. Education is the only solid ground. “Under the toe / the roots / imagine / the sun / This flame / still live ‘/ outside the body / it is my soul! »He sings in Earth. To go elsewhere, explains Vigneault, you must first “know where you come from, where you are leaving”. The goal is not to close in on oneself and enclose our little piece of land. The goal is openness. You still have to have a house, some foundations, with doors and windows to open so that the light can pass. And provided you have the words to say it.
Poets of yesterday, today and always
In the large room, there are obviously a lot of shelves. Some are filled with his storybooks, poetry, album boxes. But the eye stops at the most accessible spaces, where there are the pots of pencils, pens, markers and highlighters. Behind, with its names aligned and so legible, the collection Poets of today from Seghers. They are at attention, ready to serve and serve again: Paul Fort, Jules Supervielle, Philippe Soupault, Tristan Tzara, Aimé Césaire, Félix Leclerc, Robert Charlebois, Pauline Julien. Alive, all, since useful. The beautiful editions are at Gilles and Alison, obviously. “It is at your place that I know best / offer my fire and my place / and tell everyone I love you”, he sums up at the end of Language, my sweet country.
The album personifies in inspired words and surprisingly varied music – under the remarkable artistic direction of Jim Corcoran – what is essential to life, here and elsewhere, abroad and at home: Madame l’Eau, Monsieur l ‘ Air, Madam Light… and Fire, Earth, Language and Love, which are neither madam nor sir. Without looking like it, without starting the fire, without dazzling for the sake of dazzling, but without fearing the wonder of language either, Vigneault talks about what matters: climate change, the depletion of natural resources, the loss of memory. collective and built heritage. “What surrounds us is much more precious than we imagine, the beings as much as the elements. I do not try to pass messages, I observe, and the one who listens to us or who reads us sometimes observes with us, and that makes a lot of observations. “
Renewed observation: discussing with Gilles Vigneault is fascinating, today as yesterday. Mutual enrichment guaranteed. And as always, there are times when he speaks directly to the reader, through the interlocutor. The sentence has already been transcribed, or even already printed. Does Vigneault know? He had to be asked. “I know it now. I will know from now on! In any meeting, you have to learn something about yourself and about others. He smiles his wonderful Vigneault smile (money well placed). He found the formula that sums up the subject, it can be felt. “The sentence looks forward to the paper. “
Elsewhere with Jim Corcoran