Guy Latraverse, one of the great builders of the Quebec recording and entertainment industry, died Saturday evening following a long illness. He had been hospitalized for a month. The famous impresario and producer was 84 years old. The news was confirmed to La Presse by his daughter Zoé on Sunday afternoon.
Her sister Louise Latraverse was with members of the Latraverse family when La Presse contacted her. Saddened by the death of the man she brought into the world of the arts, she still found the words to pay tribute to him. “He was smart and he loved people. He took Quebec artists out of cabarets and told them that they too had the right to be treated as well as French artists. He was passionate and daring. See Diane Dufresne in the show Tiens-toé ben j’arrive and believe it, you had to do it. It allowed local artists to surpass themselves. »
It was a Robert Charlebois who was both shaken and eager to bear witness to the greatness of soul of his friend who spoke with La Presse on Sunday evening. He takes us back to his beginnings, at the time of La boulée, in 1963. “That’s where we met. Her sister Michèle had a desk where the tablets were held together with bricks. He bought me my first drum set. Afterwards, everything came together. »
Robert Charlebois, who is Zoé’s godfather, firmly believes that he would not have been known without the role played by Guy Latraverse. “He has been there at every crucial stage of my career. He was a genius and an extraordinary being with all the excesses that that can suppose. When he left, he went far away. He ripped it off. There were difficult years when he was very manic-depressive. When it was down and black, it showed. »
The one who offered a historic tour in recent months with Robert en CharleboisScope last saw this pillar of Quebec song three months ago in the company of Yvon Deschamps. “He’s someone I’ll have in my heart for the rest of my life. The entire backstage and frontstage of Quebec showbiz are in mourning at the moment. We owe him so much. »
Madeleine Careau, current chief executive officer of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, knew Guy Latraverse in the mid-1970s at the Quebec Summer Festival, then during the creation of the ADISQ in 1979. “He was a born entrepreneur who was not afraid to take risks. He was the first Quebecer to apply a vertical model in the entertainment world as multinationals did. He was responsible for managing artists, producing their shows and their records. He even created Kébec Films, which allowed him to produce shows about his artists. He was a true visionary. »
In the minutes following the announcement of his death, tributes multiplied on social networks. François Legault hailed “the builder” that was Guy Latraverse. For Mathieu Lacombe, Minister of Culture and Communications, the great impresario was also “a man who saw big for our artists and our culture, at a time when everything was still to be done.”
Guy Latraverse was born on July 5, 1939 in Chicoutimi. He was the eldest of a family of four children and was a year older than his sister Louise, an actress, author and director thanks to whom he entered the artistic world.
Involved since college in the organization of sporting and cultural activities, he took his first steps as a professional manager when Claude Léveillée, then his sister’s lover, asked him to take care of his accounting at the turn of the years. 1960. Quickly recruited by other artists who had little interest in numbers, Guy Latraverse gained further ground in 1962 when, after having led a negotiation for the benefit of the author of Frédéric, the latter declared that he would henceforth be his impresario.
“Impresario. I didn’t know what the word meant exactly, confides the producer in Guy Latraverse, 50 years of Quebec showbiz, a biographical book published in 2013. To my knowledge, no one had that title in Montreal. »
Guy Latraverse was at the forefront of the cultural revival that animated Quebec from the 1960s: in addition to Claude Léveillée, for whom he organized Quebec tours, he worked in particular with Pierre Calvé, Pauline Julien, Jacques Blanchet, Jean-Pierre Ferland and will be, from the 1970s, the man behind the exceptional career of Yvon Deschamps. He also extended his activities to Europe and orchestrated the visits to Quebec of artists such as Guy Béart, Léo Ferré, Petula Clark and Charles Aznavour.
Guy Latraverse is not said to be the “father of Quebec showbiz” lightly. He was, with Gilles Talbot and Gérard Thibault, one of its great builders. In addition to having been involved in just about all the major shows of the 1970s (L’Osstidcho, I saw the wolf, the fox, the lion, 1 times 5, that of Offenbach at the oratory of Saint- Joseph, etc.), he is one of the founders of ADISQ, co-founder of the Francos and was in one way or another behind all the televised galas intended to reward the artisans of Quebec culture, music to cinema through theater and humor.
His journey is marked by ideas of grandeur. He convinced Claude Léveillée to do the Place des Arts in 1964 when no local artist had yet performed alone as a headliner. He is the man behind Yvon Deschamps’ 100 evenings at the Théâtre Maisonneuve in 1977. He is also the fearless producer who presented Diane Dufresne at the 1980 Forum – the first local artist to perform there solo – and the one who made his Pink Magic show possible at the Olympic Stadium four years later. No other local artist has dared to do such a thing since.
However, his career was marked by several failures. Some of his projects (notably the presentation of the show Jaune ou… by Jean-Pierre Ferland at the Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier) pushed him into bankruptcy. Three times rather than one. He always got over it, sometimes establishing himself in the field of recording (Kébec Disques) or television (Sogestalt, Productions Samedi de Rire) and, always, in entertainment.
Guy Latraverse paradoxically drew his courage and energy from an illness that also deeply undermined him: in the mid-1980s, he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. “There wasn’t much that stood in my way in this profession. I was a good bipolar person who was really successful, he said with a laugh, during an interview with La Presse in 2013. This illness allowed me to do things like it allowed Churchill, Roosevelt and Napoleon. , all bipolar, to do business that they would never have done. »
He was also one of the first Quebec personalities to speak publicly about bipolarity and to commit to mental health. Guy Latraverse is in fact one of the founders of an association which is now called Relief (formerly Revivre) and which offers support to people suffering from anxiety, depression and bipolarity. His social commitment was also demonstrated through benefit shows such as Tous unis contre le sida and De concert avec le Saguenay, both held in 1996.
A year before founding the Francos de Montréal (which became simply the Francos) with Alain Simard, Guy Latraverse received the Félix Tribute in 1988. A reward that particularly touched him. “This evening was one of the great moments of my life because this tribute came from my peers, people who had appreciated what I had done for the Quebec entertainment industry, our business,” he says in the biographical book written with the help of former La Presse journalist Daniel Lemay.
His career has been marked by a number of prizes and distinctions awarded both by public authorities and associations of television, music and entertainment professionals. His pillar character was recognized a second time by ADISQ which, in 2013, awarded him a special Félix tribute for his 50 years spent working in the shadows to promote local artists and culture.
1964, he produced Claude Léveillée, the first Quebec singer at Place des Arts
1968, he produced L’Osstidcho King Size on tour
1971, he founded Kébec Spec
1974, he produced the show I Saw the Wolf, the Fox, the Lion with Félix Leclerc, Gilles Vigneault and Robert Charlebois
1976, he produced the show 1 fois 5 with Yvon Deschamps, Claude Léveillée, Gilles Vigneault, Jean-Pierre Ferland and Robert Charlebois
1978, he co-founded ADISQ
1984, he presented Diane Dufresne in Magie Rose at the Olympic Stadium
1985, he founded Productions Samedi de Rire with Yvon Deschamps
1989, he co-founded Les Francos de Montréal
2013, he received a tribute show from ADISQ for his 50 years in the entertainment world
