I was entering the Bagotville airport in Saguenay to catch my plane. I passed passengers who were leaving, arriving from Montreal. A very young girl caught my attention, I recognized Celine Dion.
No one seemed to be there to greet her, few people paid her any attention. I remember her teenage acne. As we passed each other, I stopped her and shook her hand, saying, “I have a little girl who would be really happy to tell her friends that I kissed Celine Dion.” She laughed and offered her cheek. I later learned that she had an engagement somewhere in Lac-Saint-Jean.
A year or two later, at Dorval airport this time. Heading towards the gate to catch my flight, I crossed the area where a plane was leaving for Abitibi. There were only a few people waiting. And I saw her, isolated in a corner, sitting with René Angélil. I understood that she was going to perform in another large centre…
She seemed very shy to me, I refrained from approaching her – as we say in our country, she was not very confident. But she was the future Céline. Who would have said it?
Ascension
I obviously followed (but from afar) her prodigious rise which would make her a very big world star, but who remains the modest little girl of Charlemagne, close to her family, in particular to her mother, whose merits she praised in the language and manner of her environment, those which all children from working-class families learned.
Except that wealth, fame, even glory, did not distract her from it. In the same interview, she could alternate between references to her American agents and her mother’s cooking recipes. I was one of those who found all this very nice, but rather disconcerting. I could not “frame” her.
I shuddered with fear when I saw her having to face the slightly snobbish fauna of the Parisian media world. People looked down on her, made fun of her words, her accent, her eloquence. But she didn’t let herself be put off, she remained Céline, completely, very much at ease. You had to be strong.
I knew his successes, of course, and I recognized his immense talent, but I was not a fan. I became one in a strange circumstance.
One day, while in Sydney for work, I went into a store to buy some souvenirs. I was moving distractedly through the aisles, not paying attention to the background music. As I was paying at the cash register, the clerk saw that I was from Quebec. She showed me the case of the CD that was playing, specifying that it was ” the biggest hit in town “, that customers were literally fighting over it. It was a Céline record. Sydney is a long way from Charlemagne. That’s when I really understood what had become of the little girl from Bagotville. I was a little embarrassed not to have realized it sooner.
Instinct
Having achieved stardom, she adopted neither its eccentric style nor its customs. She remained surrounded by her world, close to her origins. For her interviews, it was not licensed writers who dictated to her the conventional, often eccentric formulas that the general public apparently likes to hear. She made her own remarks, familiar remarks inspired by her roots.
She disconcerted her audience with her frequent references to her family – what other big star would have dared to talk about her mother’s greaves in front of a bunch of Californian reporters?
Her very personal style has long raised eyebrows in the United States and elsewhere; she stood out in the field. However, two or three weeks ago, in the pages of the very serious New York Timesone could read a report on the singer. What it said, in short, was that the media world had reconciled itself with her spontaneity, her simplicity, her modesty and, to be frank, her freshness.
The portrait that emerged, it was pointed out, did not make the sublime, capricious, deformed stars with their pre-prepared language look good. She was now complimented for what had previously discredited her. Céline: instinct, the intelligence of instinct.
Tears
Let’s get to the main point. It was very impressive, on the evening of the inauguration of the Paris Games, to see her suddenly appear very small on the first floor of the Eiffel Tower under the interplay of projectors and lasers, in this grandiose setting that served as her stage, in front of an audience that extended across the planet (am I exaggerating?).
We knew that the illness had prevented her from singing for four years. She could have tried to come back in a small concert hall far from the metropolises (in Lac-Saint-Jean?). She chose to play her all on the biggest stage imaginable.
We understand that the tension was high and her pianist himself was worried about it, asking her just before her performance if she was not too overwhelmed by stress. To which she apparently replied: “Don’t worry, check me out, I’ll be fine”… Pure Céline.
Piaf’s song, magnificent, was appropriate and the interpretation, dazzling. The artist had found all her means. Who did not hold back a little tear in front of this display of talent, courage and emotions? I was surprised by my reaction. Thank you, Madame Dion.
