Francis Cabrel and his Quebec audience, it’s a love story that has lasted for a long time. A story that the French singer-songwriter is careful to continue writing with gentleness and generosity, as he did Friday night by bringing his show of more than two hours to the Francos.
The Wilfrid-Pelletier room at Place des Arts was sold out. When Cabrel is in Montreal, his admirers respond.
A few minutes after 8 p.m., Francis Cabrel arrived on the large stage, alone. First ovation of the evening, even before the first words spoken or the first notes played. He started on the guitar with… L’alliance, by Françoise Hardy. “Many of my friends have come from the clouds…”
Cabrel was accompanied on Friday by his exceptional multi-instrumentalist musicians: a guitarist and violinist, an accordionist and pianist, a double bassist and bassist, a drummer and percussionist. A group full of talent who knew how to do justice to the successes of Francis Cabrel, but also often give them a new life, more catchy, touching and still lively.
However, the performance began on Friday in an intimate way, Cabrel alone with his guitar (which he never left) facing the room. He first played Almost Nothing then The Girl Who Accompanies Me, a 1983 success, a classic love song as Cabrel knows how to write them, which still resonates very strongly more than 40 years later in the hearts of spectators. Already, from the reaction of the crowd, it was obvious that a magical moment had just begun, the kind that takes decades to create and then maintain.
The man who began his career in the 1970s has a lot to offer when it comes to magic. If he is not the most talkative, he has several times thanked Montrealers for their loyalty. He also knew how to often make the audience laugh and entertain them with his interventions as well as with his music. The modest singer-songwriter let the music fill the evening, allowing certain songs to soar in instrumental moments of great beauty, carried by sublime arrangements.
The Occitan singer-songwriter followed up with a version of L’ ink of your eyes magnified by a second guitar and an accordion. What more could you ask for to continue the delightful moment that had just begun? The singer’s dashing voice has the same tone as always, we find memories there.
The next one, Ode to Courtly Love, one of the most recent that the Frenchman has signed, came to reaffirm his talent with words. “Eight centuries ago, a poetic movement was born in the southwest of France, that of the troubadours.” If he sang less this time, the audience listened attentively.
Some pieces that he sang were taken from the record À l’aube revenant, released in 2020. Francis Cabrel, on this 14th album that he is presenting these days with the Trobador tour, positions himself, precisely, as an heir of the troubadours, to whom he pays homage in songs. Rockstar of the Middle Ages or Te resemblance (which he wrote for his father after having put off the subject for a long time, he explained), which he performed on Friday, are an evolution of Cabrel’s repertoire where we find always the American rock side that he loves or the lulling delicacy of his most beautiful ballads.
But the vast majority of pieces in the show on Friday were from his older repertoire, the one that fans know by heart. Generous, presenting a show of around twenty songs, Francis Cabrel offered the Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier most of his great hits. With Sitting on the Edge of the World (1994), The Dress and the Ladder (2008), Des Hommes Parames (2008), Les gens absents (2004), October (1994), the singer-songwriter rocked his public over four decades filled with beauty.
And then there are those songs that inevitably trigger “Ohs” and “Ahs” of contentment, or applause reflecting enthusiasm, as soon as the first notes of their melodies are sung. Cabrel has his pockets full of these melodies and these words having the power to touch an entire room in a few seconds. He sprinkled them throughout the show, each time delighting the spectators who sang along.
First came L’encre de tes yeux – “Ahhh!” – at the beginning of the show, then Sarbacane – “Ohhh!” – shortly after. Then came Je t’aimais, je t’aime, je t’aimerai – applause! –, Rosie – another ovation –, Je l’aime à mourir, Encore et encore… Montrealers, in fact, wanted more when the show ended right after with La corrida.
Leaving himself a little desired at first before returning to the stage (time for a change of shirt!), Francis Cabrel then offered a superb stripped-down version of his Petite Marie (alone on the accordion, imagine all the “Ah”s shouted in unison), Samedi soir sur la Terre, La dame de Haute-Savoie, before a second encore, just as heartfelt, which led to the real finale, the sweet and touching C’est écrit. The nearly 3,000 spectators in the Wilfrid-Pelletier hall stood up again for a standing ovation, the kind you give in exchange for a show that has filled you with joy.
Love stories like the one between Cabrel and Montreal are magnificent. At 70 years old, the modern-day troubadour seems to still (and again), we hope, have many things to share with his Quebec audience.
