2012/06/29

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  Rue Ste-Catherine - Village - 2012.06.28 23h51 intersection Ahmerst
  Scènes de Montréal - Montreal Scenes
  

  Above

  View above is looking eastwards near Amherst St. The white tents are kiosks for a current arts festival. For a view looking in the other direction (west) from near Alexandre-de-Sève street, about ½ Km farther, click here.

  Big post for big emotions

  
  Pic © Anik MH de Carufel, Le Devoir

  « I’m giving you everything tonight, Montreal ! »

  And by golly, did he ever!

  From Sylvain Cormier in my paper: «Yes, he gave everything, starting with himself, all clad in red. Red velvet trousers, red shoes, red sweater. Magnificient. A girl's sweater, I'd swear, the top modestly covered with sequins, the bottom almost transparent, revealing the belly (it's him who said it). Tribute to the late Guilda [a transformer who died a few days ago], queen of the nights of Montreal? No! Challenge to Liza! Yes, the Minelli, who will be at the Jazz Festival on July 5. It's definitely the daughter of Judy Garland whom our Rufus has summoned to dare wear a more spectacular sweater: "Game on, Liza, game on!"

  Red as in red square, should we add. "Thanks to all the protestors for your actions, and for not doing anything tonight..." let out Rufus mid-way, underlying that the color of his costume was not accidental: "I am a large red square!" There were a few casserolers, completely in the back when I arrived, where Ste-Catherine and Place des Festival meet. A small gang, maybe twenty, serpenting in the dense crowd in an east-west direction, not towards the stage.

  Yesterday was the opening grand event of this year's Montreal Jazz Festival and Rufus Wainwright was the name of the game. Needless to say, all outdoor concerts during large festivals here are free. After years of being asked by the festival's organizers, he finally accepted to come, but no messing on smaller stages for him. The big one or nothing. This year was the one it came about. I left late (as usual ), took a BIXI and got down to the nearby St-Laurent métro station at around 9h25. There were no free spaces and it took me a good 20 minutes to finally find a parking slot for it at the corner of Berri and Ste-Catherine, metro Berri-UQAM that is, and had to walk back to finally arrive at the Place des Arts / Place des Festivals area at around 22h00. I don't know if the show started at 21h00 as it was supposed to neither do I know how much of it I missed but what I did attend until 23h10 was out of this world.

  The stage was fabulous. Adorned with a large crimson velvet looking red curtain as in old opera houses, it had six round hanging candelabras and a huge pearl-shaped one right in the center. If that curtain was fake, it sure dumbfounded everyone. With all the colors from the lighting effects, from splashing reds to deep blues to shocking pinks and soft purples, on the stage and on the ajoining Musée d'art contemporain, it created an atmosphere that no pic I took can even come close to rendering.

  Then there was Rufus himself, with his fabulous voice. And his so superb songs. And the musical arrangements. The arrangements, OMG! I swear to god, at times I had to fight my tears. It was just too overwhelming. I mean being able to convey that kind of emotion, outside under the stars, in the core of a big city, and in front of thousands and thousands of spectators, is really something exceptional.

  From the Ste-Catherine end of Place des Festivals where I arrived, I tried to make my way closer to the stage but the crowd was so dense that I could only make it one third of the way, still having to zoom with my camera for the few pics I took most of which are too blurred to be used.

  Naturally, when you talk of Rufus and the McGarrigles and the Wainwrights, you talk of family. They were all there, uncle, cousins, sister Martha who sang with him a few times, aunts Jane and especially Anna McGarrigle, sister of the late Kate, who came on stage to sing with Martha and Rufus Complainte pour Ste-Catherine, a song she wrote. A great, great moment. Place des Festivals is bordered south and north by Ste-Catherine and De Maisonneuve. Anna joked about De Maisonneuve unfortunately not being mentioned in the song. Cormier: «And all the smala sang Entre Lajeunesse et la sagesse and Rufus was beaming. "They’ll be back!", he promised, and it was true also, the time for "La complainte pour Ste-Catherine", with the Catherine at the other end of Place des Festivals waltzing in bliss». Gosh! I missed Lajeunesse! Make this

  All the rest was candy. From "Candles" (an homage to his late mother Kate McGarrigle) sung a capella with only two chorists, almost in the dark, «almost a religious song (Cormier)», to "One Man Guy", a song from his dad Loudon Wainwright, to «a jazz piece for the Jazz Festival opening event: a divine lecture for voice and trio of a beauty from Judy Garland's repertoire, The Man That Got Away. Liza Minelli, doubly challenged. Will she be told? (Cormier)»

  He had other gifts: Excursion à Venise, another Anna McGarrigle song from their "French Album" and sung for the very first time by Rufus (that one too I missed, stupid stupid me ), and «the most beautiful rendering ever heard of "Je reviendrai à Montréal", in a heart-wrenching duo with Martha» (he had sung it with its author Robert Charlebois at last year's Fête Nationale concert - see my June 25, 2011 post, for video and the song's lyrics), and Montauk a new song he wrote for his daughter Viva Katherine Wainwright Cohen, «can't get more Montreal than that» he joked, a beautiful song which I found on the net but the rendering he sang yesterday was a least doubly long, eight to ten minutes, and with arrangements that would border a symphonic orchestra. Simply grandiose. And, as curtain call, alone on the stage at his piano, Hallelujah, «hymn to the beauty of the world by the grand-dad of Viva Katherine, a Montrealer named Leonard. Yes, even him is in the family that Rufus was celebrating yesterday: his, ours. (Cormier)». Magical.

  Rufus talked at times in English but also a lot in French. He addressed the Americans in the crowd saying how elated he was with the Obamacare decision, that he was an American, since he was born in New York but raised in Montreal, dedicating his next song to Romney and Gingrich. I don't remember what the song was but I think Americans there appreciated. Many Americans come for the Jazz Festival.

  I think it was when presenting Je reviendrai à Montréal (I will come back to Montreal) that he mentioned, almost extactically, that this concert was for him «un rêve accompli» (a dream fulfilled).

  As per Rufus, all along the concert, he was his own self, flamboyant. Beautifully flamboyant. Or simply beautiful, as I told the middle-aged woman who was standing next to me with other woman friends of hers, all glued to the giant screen, mesmerized.

  And if he has accustomed us to intimate-style concerts, in this one he opened the flood gates to all the Liza Minelli or Judy Garland in him. Yes, he did give everything! I lack words to say how I and those who were there felt.

  As I mentioned, there was a giant screen just above my head, about where I had to settle when I could not advance any more nearer to the stage. Looking at him sing, I had a thought for all those whom I know would have been elated to be there with me (or without ) on Place des Festivals last night, for this oh so very special and once in a lifetime event. May I add that I had a special thought also for two Ipswich fellows of our knowing, whom I know are consumate fans of Rufus.

  I was also thinking that this world megastar had started years ago by singing in an underground café just a block and a half away, on Clark St, between St-Laurent and St-Urbain just south of Sherbrooke, the Café Sarajevo, where beginning musicians played at times for nothing or just about, just for having the opportunity of playing their music. Café Sarajevo closed down in 2006 because the musician's guild said they were exploiting musicians and had to pay them standard union fees, something the café obviously couldn't afford. I'm generally speaking for unions and workers' rights, but at times, maybe too much rigidity is just that, too much rigidity. In French there's an expression that translates as "throwing away the baby along with the bathwater". If Montreal is the cultural haven of Canada, it's in good part because of the Café Sarajevos. In 2007 it reopened much more uptown, on St-Laurent just before entering Little Italy (my area, so to speak). For all sorts of reasons, among which because uptown is not downtown, the synergy is not the same, it finally closed down for good this last February.

  There are only two videos for now on Youtube about last night's concert. The first is "Je reviendrai à Montréal", sung in duo with Martha. Too close to the stage for my liking, we miss too much of it and of the surrounding atmosphere, but at least we can see some of the candelabras.

  Among the songs I heard last night, this very nice one, Rashida, from his latest album. The orchestrations were almost as elaborate as on this studio take. You can imagine...

  And this is the (beautiful) song for his daughter which he sang as before last song, which as I mentioned was much longer and elaborate than the "offcial" video of it. Very often, on the large screens, we could see close-ups of his hands dancing literally on the piano. He truly is a very gifted musician.

  I later found this other video from last night, from the same not so good viewpoint, this time for the final song, Hallelujah, which apparently he had stopped singing live but resumed after the birth of his daughter, last year.

  Finally, to the risk of boring everyone stiff, some of my own pics (some I took had better views but are too blurred to post).

  At 22h08 - I had started advancing towards the stage but still a far cry from it.
  

  Same place and time, but zooming in.
  

  Later when I was closer (but still had to zoom).
  

  Overhead giant screen. I preferred looking at the actual stage and the crowd and all the surroundings most of the time, even if it was at a distance. The colors and the atmosphere were so much better.
  

  After the concert, I headed east on Ste-Catherine towards the Village, where I had a vanilla soft ice cream cone and then headed back home before the metro closed, near 01h00. I was too tired to take a BIXI but I felt good.

  

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