Performance halls | A two-speed fall

As theaters no longer have any gauge restrictions, performing arts actors paint a mixed portrait of the fall season. If headliners find their audience without difficulty, emerging or “niche” artists are struggling to take their route.

Charles-Éric Blais-Poulin
Press

Contralto Marie-Nicole Lemieux and pianist Daniel Blumenthal, September 14, 16 and 18, 2018 at Bourgie Hall, in Montreal; all the banknotes fly away in a gust of wind. Three years later, same duo, same place, same price, the 1^er December 2021; two days before the performance, barely half of the tickets were sold.

“It’s phenomenal to go from some 1,500 to 250 tickets for the same offer, three years later, regrets Isolde Lagacé, general and artistic director of the concert hall of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. I am optimistic by nature, but reasonable. Things are getting better and better, but it is very different from before the pandemic. ”

Year in and year out, the 460 seats in Bourgie Hall are two-thirds occupied.

Since November 15, all cinemas in Quebec have been authorized to operate at maximum capacity, even in general admission. What does it matter! Michel Sabourin, president of Club Soda, is in low spirits. In normal times, the institution on Saint-Laurent Boulevard has an attendance rate of around 70%. The average attendance and the number of events have halved this fall, notes the manager, also a spokesperson for the ‘Association of independent performance halls of Quebec.

“In November 2019, we sold 9,000 tickets,” says Mr. Sabourin, who also has to deal with the labor shortage. This year, it’s 4000… And that includes tickets that were already sold for shows that were postponed from March 2020 to today. Just for Arnaud Soly, that represents some 1000 tickets. ”

Wearing a compulsory mask, lack of physical distancing, conscious or unconscious fear of COVID-19, home-based habits: a significant proportion of the public still prefers the “sofa” club.

A situation all the more heartbreaking since the performing arts had the wind in their sails before the COVID-19 tsunami. In 2019, theatrical admissions jumped 13% from the previous year, according to the Institut de la statistique du Québec. Sadly, attendance fell 84% in the first year of the pandemic.

To help its cash-strapped members, the SMAQs launched the # SupportVosScènes crowdfunding campaign. The initiative, which will conclude at the Petit Campus on December 11 with a concert by rappers Ragers and Naya Ali, aims to raise $ 50,000 through the sale of vouchers. Here again, the mobilization is timid: only $ 2,000 had been raised at the time of publication.

At the last minute

The musicians multiply their hands extended to the public, abused by the countless postponements, reimbursements and reorganizations of rooms. “Come and see us for real,” implored Vincent Vallières, presenting an award at the ADISQ gala on November 7. You won’t believe it, how good it will do you! ”

The call seems to have been half heard. Singer-songwriter Émile Bilodeau had to give up his show at MTELUS on December 12. A case in point with “multiple facets”, nuance however Rémi Marsan, director of shows at Bravo Musique, which also represents Cœur de pirate, Gab Bouchard or even Évelyne Brochu. “It’s all going well for us, but it’s not an explosion of people pitching in the theaters,” he said.

One word comes up constantly when it comes to scenic autumn: “slowness”.

Predictability is a huge asset for the performing arts industry. The programmers are already preparing their calendar for 2023, or even 2024, without really knowing what to expect, both in terms of government aid and public habits.

M^me Drolet, also administrative director of the La Licorne theater, speaks of a subscription campaign “a little failed” this fall, when the gauges were limited. “Everything sold out, but overnight 16,000 tickets became available. It was no longer settled, our business; we had to start over. ”

Risk of congestion

Just because there are more tickets in circulation does not mean that there are more spectators or venues available overnight. “At the starting line, there are a lot of players,” notes Rémi Marsan, from Bravo Musique. The real question is more in the long run. As there will be congestion, where will developing artists end up in all of this? ”

“It concerns us for the niche disciplines: dance, theater, circus, emerging song,” adds Julie-Anne Richard, executive director of the organization RIDEAU, which brings together more than 350 performance venues in Quebec. All the efforts that have been made in audience development have been somewhat wiped out by the pandemic. We must start from zero, re-convince. We don’t have to worry about selling the big popular shows and the popular shows, but how will it manifest itself on the side of multidisciplinary audiences? ”

Speaking of “big popular shows” … The Cowboys Fringants, as a reunion, filled three Bell Centers last week, and are likely to achieve a fourth time on December 27th.

Proof that the situation is mixed. “Things are going really well in Montreal,” says Nick Farkas, vice-president, programming, concerts and events, at evenko. We sell a lot of tickets. MTELUS, Corona, L’Astral… I have never seen so many shows. Since the opening of the rooms in general admission, it is very positive. ”

This is without counting the comedians in sight – Louis-José Houde, Sam Breton, Lise Dion, Alexandre Barrette, Simon Leblanc – who collect the additional ones all over Quebec.

Isolde Lagacé, from the Bourgie room, can see the end of the tunnel. The two performances of the annual concert Charlie Brown’s Christmas, on December 15 and 16, are sold out.

“Optimistic by nature, but reasonable,” she told us at the start of the interview … “We have a fragile ecosystem in the arts. In the slightest, we unbalance it, we risk paying the price. ”