There was a funny – not funny at all – sensation, Thursday evening, in the grounds of MTELUS, before the passage of Montreal of the youngest of the veterans, Louis-Jean Cormier.
A feeling of enjoying a privilege, a few days before night falls on the performing arts, which will be cut from half of their audience on Monday. A feeling of mistrust, too, while more than 2,000 spectators were gathered without physical distancing – with a mini-minority of unmasked – as Quebec borders on 4,000 daily cases of COVID-19.
Omicron appears to have been escorted to the door, and it was the first of the two sentiments that triumphed as soon as Louis-Jean Cormier appeared on the instrumental intro of 100 meters hurdles, before settling down alone at the piano to dismantle at will I climbed.
Its three musicians, François Lafontaine (keyboards), Amélie Mandeville (keyboard, bass, vocals) and Marc-André Larocque (percussions), were quick to electrify the introduction.
PHOTO SARAH MONGEAU-BIRKETT, THE PRESS
Louis-Jean Cormier performing at MTELUS, Thursday evening
“You have no idea, Montreal, how much I wait for that moment, how much we wait for that moment,” said the recent forty-something.
Short context, borrowed from the description of the concert: “The show initially scheduled for May 22, 2020 at MTELUS, then postponed to December 9, 2020 and April 15, 2021, will be postponed again to December 16, 2021.”
We were finally there. And we almost weren’t there. “It could be that we can not replay before a little while,” said the singer-songwriter, who sealed Thursday his disconcerting year of concerts.
We are in need of music: are you in need of music? It could be that we stretch.
Louis-Jean Cormier, performing at MTELUS
We had to take advantage of the moment, without asking ourselves too much when we would see such a density of spectators in general admission, perhaps somewhere in 2022.
Everything falls in its place, after all, pleaded Louis-Jean Cormier in an elongated and psychotonic version. Because in concert, the jack-of-all-trades cut up the songs, rearrange them, tamper with them, give them a going that does not exist on disc. Or on discs. Thursday evening, postponements oblige, was mainly built around the albums When the night falls (2020) and The sky is on the floor (2021).
It was from this second offering, largely devoted to mourning for the father, that the greatest emotional charge arose. He will admit at the piano no Believe in nothing, with, for the first time, musicians in detention. The crowd, until then dancing, collects itself, phone in hand to – perhaps paradoxically – capture the moment.
PHOTO SARAH MONGEAU-BIRKETT, THE PRESS
Louis-Jean Cormier performing at MTELUS, Thursday evening
Still for his father and with a double meaning too current, Cormier will stay in front of his instrument to emphasize The irony : “The curtain falls, just as I was coming back to you. ”
The boss is in control. They quickly become titles of When the night falls, The lines of your hand and I myself, which invite us back to the “disco”.
It’s dancing and singing, two activities that will be banned at the turn of the weekend. Good news, no one thinks about it except us.
During the generous show, Louis-Jean Cormier does not fail to attend the Major arteries (2015) otherwise. “Luis Juan Cormière” interrupts If you come back with a monologue on his caliber mustache ” Narcos season 3 ”, or even chisels St-Michel of a jam epic.
The lighting and projections, sober, accompany without disturbing. We would like to reproach Louis-Jean Cormier for a lack of connivance with his musicians that he approached them and looked at them immediately. He loses the thread he brings back illico, with humor, his ADD. Road reflexes, which plugs faults as soon as they appear.
PHOTO SARAH MONGEAU-BIRKETT, THE PRESS
Louis-Jean Cormier performing at MTELUS, Thursday evening
It’s almost the end, and Everyone at the same time, picked at Thirteenth floor (2012), offers itself as a final release before the unknown.
The deadline deprives us of the reminder, imposed by the “Ho he, ho he he he he he ho he”, as we leave to write these lines. By way of swan song, Louis-Jean Cormier played The picture, have we all the same checked: “When the night falls / Whenever I see the end of the world / I go up here and I take the worn photo in my hands. ”
Many of them will undoubtedly have a photo or video of their phone on their phone. Believe in nothing, just in case. “Thank you for carrying Quebec culture at arm’s length,” we finally echoed as we walked through the door of MTELUS. Salomé Leclerc had provided – in all senses – the first part.