Review | What remains of Renaud

(Gatineau) We are not going to see Renaud on stage in 2024 without knowing that he no longer has the voice he had. Her show on Tuesday in Gatineau, the inaugural concert of her first Quebec tour in more than 15 years, nevertheless showed a radically diminished icon, who only walks in the shadow of herself.

You must have loved Renaud a lot to applaud him like the crowd who came to see him at the Odyssée Hall in Gatineau did on Tuesday. The entire room rose to its feet at the end of the main block of the show to demand an encore. However, Renaud had just painfully put through around twenty songs, a poor performance never seen in 25 years in the business.

He most often stood in the center of the stage, motionless, looking far away at the crowd. He had also sometimes screwed it to his feet, where there was a screen probably serving as a teleprompter. That Renaud needs such a crutch to avoid memory lapses when he sings is not a problem. What is one is that he now sings less than ever.

It’s easy to say that he never had a great voice. That’s true, of course. However, you just have to listen again to his records from the 1980s and early 1990s to remember that he had more than enough to harangue his audience and make their hearts beat. You have to have seen him on stage 25 or 30 years ago to know that Renaud had all the necessary vigor in his vocal cords. To also remember that he was as entertaining when he spoke between his songs as he could be touching when singing them.

What was left of this Renaud on Tuesday in Gatineau? Almost nothing, unfortunately.

Planted in the middle of a generous orchestra of around ten musicians – mainly strings – he mumbled words that the accordionist could no longer make cry. Even knowing the words of Germaine, Death children, Angling, Hundred years, Stone merchant, Manhattan-Kabul, titi’s mother and almost all the other songs played on Tuesday, we barely understood one word out of three…

What did the crowd do in the face of this catastrophe? She listened. Politely. Sometimes with palpable emotion as during winner Mistral. Or with surprise, as during On my shoulder, borrowed from Cowboys Fringants and dedicated to Karl Tremblay. She also sang a little, with joy, in memory of yesterday’s pleasures, during As soon as the wind blows, performed at the end of the program.

We can argue that Renaud makes no secret of the health problems that have plagued him since his first big descent to the bottom of the Ricard bottle at the turn of the 2000s. We can say that those who buy tickets to see him in 2024, after unconvincing visits to Quebec in 2001 and 2007 and after having seen the videos circulating of his concerts in France, do so with full knowledge of the facts.

But the fact remains that the most beautiful thing about this concert was the music. The pieces had been arranged with great elegance for an orchestra dominated by the strings – violin, viola, cello – supported here by a guitar, there by an accordion and a piano.

This music, played with the sensitivity or enthusiasm that it commanded, was close here to the musette waltz and there to those Irish tunes that Renaud is fond of. This is where the ear had to take refuge to find pleasure.

You must have loved Renaud very much to listen to him with such attention for more than two hours, despite his lost verve, despite this voice which was lost in the hoarse slippages and despite the diction problems so significant that we sometimes did not even understand not what he said. We saw barely half a dozen people leave the room before the end of the concert. Such proof of love is unheard of.

In concert in Sainte-Agathe-des-Monts (May 16), Montreal (May 17), Trois-Rivières (May 19) and Quebec (May 21)

Visit the artist’s website