Without having the erudition of a Claude Gingras, who made rain and shine in Press for decades, Michel Tremblay would undoubtedly have made many musicians, opera directors and conductors tremble with terror if he had been a classical music critic.
A warned music lover, the writer has a very sharp pen, and sometimes a chouïa of bad faith, when the time comes to make fun of the affected complexity of an arrangement, the rigidity of a singer’s playing and the tinsel of a show to large deployment. We understand very early on why André Gagnon, to whom is dedicated Musical offerings, loved everything he wrote about music.
As part of his series of memoirs where he recounted his cinematographic, theatrical and literary pleasures and misfortunes (Animated views, Twelve twists and turns, A horned angel with tin wings…), Musical offerings, also in an audio version narrated by Gilles Renaud, comes in a dozen memories where music plays a leading role. From musical discoveries to show reviews, from happy moments in his youth to painful family episodes, from Bach to Verdi, from Barbara to Céline, Tremblay reveals how certain works have inspired his own. “If I hadn’t attended that concert that night, Yours forever, your Marie-Lou might not exist. “
Operas, musicals, French variety, pop divas: Michel Tremblay loves everything with passion. Without guilty pleasure. Or so little. Thanks to his humble, moving and enthusiastic way of describing the tunes he loves so much, the reader will want to enhance the pleasure of reading by listening to the songs cited.
Revealing that his relationship to music, without which he would not survive, has changed for health reasons (“Now I write in silence, but I have long worked with the comforting support of music”), Tremblay certainly does not want the reader to sink into melancholy. Thus, after having entertained him with so much verve, the author offers as codas two amusing stories featuring his favorite character, Édouard dit la Duchesse de Langeais and her scathing critical spirit.