The artists who will participate in the big show on Saturday at Maisonneuve Park, to mark Quebec’s national holiday, describe the affair between Émile Bilodeau and the Parti Québécois (PQ) as a “storm in a glass of water”. ” Do you speak ! exclaimed Marjo in an interview. It’s ridiculous to do that. We are celebrating. »
Like several singers surveyed by La Presse on Thursday, during rehearsals for the Montreal concert, the rocker finds the situation exasperating.
Last Monday, the PQ announced that it refused to participate in the official ceremony of the Quebec show, which is to take place on the Plains of Abraham this Friday. The party is protesting against the choice of Émile Bilodeau as host of the event, after the singer-songwriter disrespected the political party led by Paul St-Pierre Plamondon and attacked the the secularism of the State (known as “Law 21”).
For Marjo, the role of artists who participate in the celebrations surrounding the national holiday is to “give fun, make people dance and sing” people, not to “make people think”. The singer invited the PQ and Émile Bilodeau to “settle their accounts separately, not when we are celebrating”.
Many of the headliners of the Montreal edition of the June 24 show seemed unfazed by all this controversy.
For Isabelle Boulay, this controversy is “boring”. The interpreter prefers to devote his energies to “celebrating our nation”, its “particularities” and “its great hospitality”.
“I really like Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, I really like Émile Bilodeau as well. I think maybe they’re not that far apart in their thinking,” the singer added.
“We make music,” commented Scott-Pien Picard. It’s no use arguing. »
For his part, FouKi simply wants to avoid public chicanery.
“I have nothing against Émile Bilodeau,” the rapper said. I find it super lit, super funny. But me, if I have a position to take, it will be in a song that I will propose it. It’s not going to be interviewing or doing a post. »
Reactions like that of the PQ contribute to the lack of political commitment of young artists, denounces Lydia Képinski.
“Today, nobody [engages] because everyone is afraid, commented the interpreter. Of course, if things like that happen to Émile, imagine anyone else. »
Lydia Képinski judges the attitude of the PQ “dichotomous”.
The artist also qualifies as “counterproductive” the treatment reserved for the singer.
“I find it ridiculous for the PQ to attack the only openly sovereignist young artist in Quebec,” said the indie pop singer.
Like her colleagues, Lydia Képinski stressed that above all, the national holiday is “the day when we tell ourselves that we are all Quebecers, that we are all part of a project that unites us, and that’s it. which is beautiful”.