In the show that he takes from festival to festival during the summer, she is there. Miss Ecstasy never leaves his Dumas, and vice versa. For 25 years, song and singer have been linked. Even more: married. After meeting in Victoriaville between a guitar and a sheet of paper, then dating in secret while he tried out rhymes in English like all the teenagers of the grunge generation, they united their destiny in front of the almighty public one evening in 1999 at the chic Palace in Granby, at the final of the most famous song contest in French-speaking America. “I couldn’t not sing it. It follows me. I love it for life!”
At these words, Dumas bursts out laughing in the Dumas style, climbing the ladder of a handsome, happy and contagious sick man. “I’m sure I’m going to celebrate her at the anniversary show that the festival is offering me this year, but not alone!” Guest of honor this Sunday on the stage of the Marché public, he will be celebrating ecstatically with his beauties, including his Missbut sharing with a host of guests to his taste as a die-hard fan of today’s songs. Émile Bourgault, a very young winner of the 2023 edition, will be there. The phenomenal trio Le Roy, la Rose et le Lou[p] also. “I work to copy the chords of their songs: that’s my reward!”
The bigamist
Will Dumas also do it again? The writer ? Wasn’t he a bigamist that famous evening in Granby? “Yes, a bigamist!” He laughs again. “For the competition, at that time, you showed up with two songs, from the audition to the final. I had two of them.” The same ones that had been rejected outright the year before. An incredible story, where luck and perseverance are smirked at. “In 1998, I had sent in a home recording that wasn’t too good. They said no right after the audition, and they were right,” says the singer-songwriter. “In hindsight, it’s obvious that I wasn’t ready. It still nipped in the bud my fabulous career, let’s say. My secret dream was going to the wayside. The following year, when it came time to register, I wasn’t too keen. One rejection was enough for me. It was my mother who pushed me, who paid for me to register. And I was held back.”
Just barely. “The story, which I learned later, is that I had not been selected, once again. It was Marc Déry, the spokesperson that year, who, in extremis, went to get my cassette from the box of rejected candidates, and who told everyone: “No no no, he has to go, he has what it takes!” His gesture changed the trajectory of my life. At Victo, I was a gas station attendant. I’m not sure I would have tried a third time. Yes, my friends at Victo thought I was no worse, but confidence is still fragile at that age. I was not twenty years old.”
Big prize and big expectations
Winning in Granby. The jackpot, especially at the time. From one day to the next, each winner carries his luck around while pinching himself, accumulates bravos, does not really know what awaits him. Namely: the blind dive into the profession, accompanied by the welcome tax in the industry. “From the semi-final, I felt that I was generating interest. The guys from the record companies were there.” All, on the lookout, on his case. The support multiplies. Media outlets become infatuated. “The radio host Chantal Jolis had liked The writer and decided to take me under her wing. I couldn’t believe it. Looking back, I think she probably saw the Thomas Fersen side in that song. It was after the album came out Fish day, I listened to the CD all the time. The influence, now, I hear it. She had a keen ear.”
Miss Ecstasy was the expected hit, but not so much Dumas’ first album. “Une méchante débarque, to tell the truth. We had hardly sold any copies. You had convinced Granby, but everything remained to be proven. You are drafted, like in hockey, that’s already a lot, but that’s not all. I remember that the first showswe gave away tickets so that people could come and see me. We didn’t know each other yet, the public and I.” It was in the second album, The course of daysthat success really came, to the point of proving to be lasting. Four years after Granby. “An incredible springboard, but a beginning nonetheless. It was when you left Granby that you were going to experience the ethics of real work for the first time. I was well surrounded, but I had everything to learn, everything to understand.”
“Granby, for me, represents youth, novelty,” Dumas continues. “I wanted to reflect that in the show that we’re going to do. In all honesty, I’m taking the opportunity to find myself among artists who resemble the little guy from Victo that I was, dashing and passionate. I’m still a music fanatic, I buy records from all eras, but now I know that Granby will once again give me a dose of energy that can only do me good. ” Miss Ecstasy and he will certainly take advantage of this to renew their vows.