Daniel Lavoie was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame last week alongside Bryan Adams, David Foster and Alanis Morissette. Discussion with this goldsmith who has 50 years of experience.
Posted at 9:00 a.m.
“His language, his music are eminently North American, and that’s what he brings, better than anyone, to popular French-speaking music worldwide. It is in these words that Jim Corcoran described the work of Daniel Lavoie during the induction ceremony which took place in Toronto. A presentation that pleased the principal concerned.
“I knew Jim was the right person. He has the intelligence and sense of humor that make you always feel good when you go after him,” the Franco-Manitoban singer-songwriter told us with a smile during a short visit to Montreal.
But what did he say to the public attending the ceremony? “How privileged and lucky I felt to have been chosen by the public…” He stops for a moment. “Do you really want to know what I said?” »
I said that to get that honor, you definitely need a few songs that everyone knows. And that I noticed that all those who practice this profession seriously, with love and passion, we all know how to write a good song. But that even the greatest can’t write a great song. Great songs are decided by the audience.
Daniel Lavoie
Of They love each other at Who knows, Daniel Lavoie has written some of the most beautiful songs of the Francophonie. However, he remains “humble and lucid”, convinced that there is an element of chance for an artist to be “chosen” by the public. “This relationship is very fleeting,” he adds. This moment of grace where the songs “connect with the world”, when it locks, can last six months, a year, three years. “Afterwards they take on crazier young people to make the bougalous dance. And we go back to writing good songs. »
In his case, this period stretched over almost ten years. She started with Warning voltage, his sixth album released in 1983, on which the song appeared They love each otherand whose very “English sound” keyboards have made him a dazzling success, here and on the other side of the Atlantic.
“Afterwards, I had another three or four albums which touched everyone and that is a great privilege. People say, but you worked… well no, everyone works! You have to hit the target of people’s hearts, and that’s luck. »
Rimbaud
Daniel Lavoie launched a compilation of his greatest hits in March entitled I left my islandand will mark the 40th anniversary of Voltage Caution in a tour that will begin in April 2023.
The singer, who was part of the original cast of Notre Dame of Paris in 1998, also reprized his role as Frollo this summer in a series of shows presented here and in New York. At 73, he still loves the stage… but has to make an effort to get back on it.
I have to kick my ass because I don’t have the energy I had. But I like it, it keeps me alive, in touch. And it allows me to make music with good musicians.
Daniel Lavoie
By choice, Daniel Lavoie has been rather discreet since my long journeyshis most recent album of original songs released in 2016. And if at the moment he seems omnipresent, it is mainly a combination of circumstances. Humanisms, his third collection of fables, released in June, had been ready for two years. And the very recent album Cassis river, where he sings texts by Rimbaud set to music by Laurent Guardo, is a project on which the two men had been working for eight years! “Laurent is a marvelous madman,” says the singer. He is doing this project out of passion, I out of pleasure. And I love to sing his music. »
And what do Rimbaud’s words tell us today? “It’s poetry, so open to interpretation. And his language is still beautiful. Then some poems, like The sleeper of the valley, which talk about the absurdity of war, are still ridiculously relevant. »
We can only make the link with his song They love each other, whose message is just as powerful 40 years later. “I had written it during the war of factions in Beirut. I never thought it would stay so current. »
Today indeed, enemy brothers and sisters are fighting in Ukraine. He sighs shaking his head. ” It is the horror. I sang in both countries, which I love very much. The war never brought a solution. It’s always caused by absurd, power-hungry fools. »
Depth
Laurent Guardo, for whom this is the second project with Daniel Lavoie, is full of praise for him. “It’s not just the voice,” he said. It is the human being who has a depth, and all the emotion he conveys. »
The musician boasts of his open-mindedness, his great musical culture and his humility.
The thing I love about him is that he doesn’t age! And that’s because he’s always having fun in what he does.
Laurent Guardo
Pleasure, Daniel Lavoie had while concocting the collection Humanisms, in which he associates a musical suggestion to accompany the reading of each fable. “It was to make it fun! And so that we take the time to see the other levels of reading. »
PHOTO MARTIN CHAMBERLAND, THE PRESS
Daniel Lavoie
Daniel Lavoie wrote this book because he felt he had “understood everything there was to understand about this damn life”, and after years of searching, he came up against the ” wall of mystery”. “This collection is the wall of the I-don’t-know. And an opportunity to share his tender and amused view of the human condition. “I wanted it to be a reassuring book that would do you good. »
Without restraint
Six years after having serious health problems (lung infection) and close to death, Daniel Lavoie is in great shape and “doing what it takes” to be well. He writes every day, but without constraints or expectations, lives in Bologna, Italy — he is currently composing songs in Italian! -, and simply wishes to be “happy and joyful”. “I don’t want anything else. Also wish me that the war in Ukraine ends. After that, we find a solution to our climate problem. »
He dreams of a world less materialistic and more guided by the heart. “Rather than accumulating useless things, I would like everyone to write books, songs, paint. Let everyone do things with their hands, their heads, their hearts, instead of looking for happiness in things. »