SAINT-VENANT-DE-PAQUETTE | He’s one of our greats. With his sister Marie-Claire, with fiori and solo, Richard Séguin has written some of the most beautiful pages in the history of French-speaking Quebec music. He’s 70 years old but doesn’t do them at all. He continues to create songs and artworks in his beloved village of Saint-Venant-de-Paquette in Estrie. He has everything to be happy, but he feels the need to sound the alarm: our culture is in danger, we must do something.
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“It is unfortunate that in Quebec, the French song is heard on the platforms at a rate between 7% and 9%. It worries me a bit.” (see box Data of Concern below)
A little? You should have seen him burst into flames at the cafe in his village, where he hosted the Journal’s rep for a lengthy interview last month as our conversation about protecting Quebec’s French-speaking music culture spun.
“I don’t understand the stations that bombard us with American charts. It pervades our entire unconscious, it standardizes everything. Heille, you’re leaving me alone…” he protests. “I have nothing against American music, I listen to it a lot, English music, world music. There is still a priority or urgency to leave room for francophone creation in Quebec. What will happen to the song if we don’t act now? I’m afraid it will be fringe music. She’s already marginalized…”
Raise
It never occurs to them that our musical heritage is not conveyed or highlighted to the younger generation.
“Young people don’t know Pauline Julien. You don’t really know the work of Léveillée, by Sylvain Lelièvre. The list is long, we could go back to Vigneault. I think it’s very, very detrimental to our culture.”
We have to educate, emphasizes Richard Séguin.
“We fought and we will have a house of songs. Monique Giroux fought for this, although the question does not even arise in Europe. In France, people will tame their literary heritage, their song heritage, their poetic heritage. They even know where what they are [les artistes] are buried. It is studied in schools. We have much to catch up.”
But if you make the effort, it works, he remarks, recalling his participation in the music project Douze hommes rapaillés based on poems by Gaston Miron. (see box Miron’s Words in Music below)
“The reception from the people was amazing. They reacted to that. They drank every one of Miron’s lyrics. This is an initiative. There was a very strong Miron effect.”
Like and spread
Education is important, but that’s not all. In order for French-language singing to stay alive here, you have to love it and make it heard, says the man who enjoyed immense public success with his albums “Double vie”, “Journée d’Amérique” and “Aux Portes du Matin”.
“That is the first condition. You must love the creation that is made here. If you like something, you want to spread it. Sometimes I ask broadcasters and they say that’s not what they do [leurs auditeurs] want to hear. Yes, but you don’t give them a choice. If you want us to listen to something, give a choice and then we’ll find out if you want to hear it. Me, Rihanna, I am very happy that she is making a career, but I would also like to hear Marie-Pierre Arthur. Give me the choice!”
The resulting danger, as he mentioned above, is the standardization of what reaches our ears. The consequences can already be observed.
“My sister was asked by a teacher to teach her students some basic principles of vocalizations because she was organizing an end-of-year show. When she got there, she found that the whole show was in English. Surprisingly, the professor hadn’t noticed,” says Richard Séguin.
influence of Felix
He himself provides a good example of the importance of knowing the musical culture of his people well when asked who were the most important people in his artistic career.
He spontaneously appoints Félix Leclerc.
“Even though I’ve only met him twice in my life, Félix remains a beacon for me when it comes to how to do your job, how to approach the song, how to integrate life and creation into one. I read a lot in his notebooks. These are small, simple philosophical reflections that are part of everyday life. He really influenced me.”
In return, he wants to lengthen the torch so that Quebec French-language singing will last a long time.
Worrying Data
For the first time in 2021 and only from October 15, the Observatoire de la culture et des communication du Québec (OCCQ) was able to measure the percentage of Quebec content consumed on streaming music platforms. This percentage is 8.6%. Since the data is not counted by language, and since artists singing in English such as Charlotte Cardin and Celine Dion are among the most popular, listening to French-language Quebec content can be expected to be under 8.6%. A spokesman for the OCCQ says the organization expects to be able to present this data in its 2022 report.
Source: The Quebec Music Market in 2021
Miron’s words in music
In 2008, twelve artists came together to set the words of the poet Gaston Miron to music on the album Douze hommes rapaillés chantent Miron. In addition to Richard Séguin, Gilles Bélanger (designer), Louis-Jean Cormier (director), Jim Corcoran, Michel Rivard, Pierre Flynn, Daniel Lavoie, Michel Faubert, Yann Perreau, Martin Léon, Vincent Vallières and Plume Latraverse participate in the project, which includes two others albums and some event concerts.
Richard Séguin was always smiling on stage. In front of him, almost at his feet, the audience listened in respectful silence, clapping their hands and singing the choruses at the appropriate times.
“We’re close, huh? When I say I touched my audience, it’s not a metaphor,” laughed Séguin, in his element in the hushed intimacy of the Théâtre Petit Champlain, on October 19, during the first of several performances of the show he took over in Quebec new album entitled Les liens les lieux.
The Richard Séguin on stage looks like the one those who have met him personally know: friendly, easy-going, eager to put his family’s happiness ahead of others, human.
People, especially people, with legitimate concerns about the future of our species and our planet. He uses his privileged contact with the public to put the spotlight on the causes and people he cares about.
The song “Roadie”, “it’s in the shade for the workers”, he says of the technicians that make it possible to host a concert.
In addition, Au bord du temps offers the opportunity to deal with the fate of migrants.
What are we leaving them? Preceded is a hat for reconnaissance work to protect the territory of the Mothers at the Front organization.
We will also talk about our forest wealth, the moving beauty of the stars in the Far North sky, about his mother “who made sure there was culture in the house”.
A Richard Séguin concert would not be complete without a declaration of love for his working language.
He thus anticipates his electric interpretation of L’ange vagabond in homage to Jack Kerouac by citing the words of the famous American poet of French-Canadian origin. “When I’m angry, I swear in French. When I dream, I often dream in French, and when I yell, I always yell in French.”
A great gentleman, this Richard Séguin!
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