This world music quartet (with a guest bass guitar player) hails from Quebec and on Sunday wowed a crowd of about 250 with their traditional French-Canadian and Celtic dance tunes. Nicolas Boulerice (hurdy-gurdy), Simon Beaudry (guitar and bouzouki), Olivier Demers (violin and guitar), and Réjean Brunet (accordion) make up the quartet. And don’t let that list of instruments fool you—they all played multiple instruments as needed. I’m pretty sure that each took a turn on a guitar during the afternoon. The guest bass guitarist was also their sound design man. At one point, each (all?) of the instruments was (were) electronically miked. I wish I could have heard them unadorned—my bet is that these four could have done without a sound system altogether.
That and the fact that most of the high-energy songs they performed were very similar are my only minor quibbles. I especially liked a lot of the vocals, including four-part harmonies and at least one piece that reminded me of medieval part singing. The folk aspect lent a bit of raucous vocal tone but that was exactly what was needed. Some of the pieces were call-and-response types, where one guy would sing a phrase and then two or all three of the others would repeat it. They even expanded that to teaching the audience a phrase or two that we were then cued to repeat as requested during one of the songs. Not my favorite type of crowd involvement, as some of my regular readers will know.
Since there was no printed program, I have no titles to report, though if I’m remembering correctly one was Adieu, Marie (or something very close to that). The staged movement was minimal yet effective, with the members pairing up or grouping together. Of special note, the fiddler, for in reality that’s what he was, also provided percussion via what appeared to be a small wooden stage/sounding board that he used to create clog-like rhythms. Some impromptu dancing in the aisles led to the guys saying that anybody could join in—which sort of led to a standing ovation because a lot of folks were up on their feet, grooving, at the end of the last piece on the program. Sneaky, boys, very sneaky!
Throughout there was much rhythmic clapping from the audience and that carried over into the well-deserved encore. As eclectic as the quartet was, so was the audience. We ranged from little children to tweens/teens to adults (up to 75 or 80 years old would be my best guess). This was a venue that was new to me—Abrons Arts Center at Henry Street Settlement—on the Lower East Side. Not my usual stomping grounds. It was a very nicely appointed 300-seat theater. I’ll keep an eye out for more performances down there.
This free Neighborhood Concert series under the auspices of Carnegie Hall is winding down for the season. I didn’t quite make my goal of a concert in each borough but I certainly got to see new venues and different parts of the city. Bravo Carnegie, bravo Le Vent du Nord, vive les French-Canadiens!
ConcertMeister
V. cool, Uncke ConcertMeister!
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