BAIE SAINT PAUL | The pianist offered a sublime and magnificent moment of grace to festival-goers this Saturday! Let yourself be lulled by the divine melodies.
• Also read: Le Festif!: a great program for the second day
The sun beat down on “the most beautiful stage in the world”, at least the most beautiful in Baie Saint-Paul and the Festif for sure! … Earlier, Gawbé had expertly set the table on the wharf, presenting a show that relied on ‘gentle morning’-style arrangements rather than his usual rockier performances. At the mouth of the Gouffre and the river, about twenty people had paddled up to see the concert from the river, from their kayaks, canoes or comfortably seated on their paddle boards. The standing crowd, more than large, literally overcrowded, untied their legs in sweet anticipation.
Credit Samuel Gaudreault
The context was just perfect. Everything was ready for the magic.
For the first time in Baie-Saint-Paul, the long-awaited Jean-Michel Blais sat down alone behind his piano and began the first notes of the slow Ad Claritatem Domine. Time stood still, there was only the essential: the rush of the wind, the laughter of the children in the distance, the gentle murmur of the waves and the immense beauty of his music.
Credit Samuel Gaudreault
He was then quietly joined by his musicians Nadia Monczak (violin), Lorraine Gauthier-Giroux (cello) and Benjamin Deschamps (clarinet, bass clarinet, transverse flute and soprano saxophone) as they gently began the piece absinthe.
“There are so many people! I thought there would be no one last night to see the world awake!” exclaimed half charming, half mocking the pianist before wryly apologizing for the glorious sunset when the weather forecast called for rain.
Credit Samuel Gaudreault
All the elements seemed to be coordinated to offer festival-goers this moment of great beauty. “We’re outside experiencing something really unique, feel free to enjoy the surrounding sounds,” he recalls.
The quartet presented several pieces from their latest album Aubades, released in 2022, with “each piece meant to be an awakening” to an admirably silent, appreciative and attentive audience. Murmures, a piece in which he wanted to introduce each instrument individually, proved another moment of grace; the luminous flâneur, reminiscent of the moment when one wanders at dawn; the delicate and elegant Passepied, both inspired by Debussy and inspired by a baroque dance. Many smiled on delighted faces during this heartfelt rendition, which received warm applause.
Credit Samuel Gaudreault
The complicity between the 39-year-old artist and his musicians, whom he liked to tease, was palpable. We felt it all the more in the finale of “Nina”, where he somehow draws a parallel between the difficulty of learning to write for other instruments and the difficulty of a child in learning their first steps. The cellist, the wind multi-instrumentalist and the violinist took it in turns to carefully complete the last bars of the piece with him on the piano. A moment full of charm and complicity that enchanted.
Jean-Michel Blais Outsiders then played the piano alone. The silence was so great that it seemed as if the sound of the waves accompanied it.
Credit Samuel Gaudreault
When the quartet performed the magnificent piece “Le Souper”, the sky was cloudy and the breeze was cooling. Some were no doubt aware that a veritable window of glorious weather had opened, allowing the artist to depict this moment of great beauty. Doux, then Nostos as an encore finally rounded off this unique concert.
Jean-Michel Blais had inevitably seduced.