FROM THE POST-CLASSICAL ICON’S FIRST ENSEMBLE ALBUM AND 2022 POLARIS MUSIC PRIZE NOMINATED LP AUBADES
LISTEN / SHARE / BUY / STREAM “AMOUR” - PIANO” HERE
2022 TOUR DATES CONTINUES WITH STOPS AT MONTREAL JAZZ FEST THIS WEEK, NATIONAL ARTS CENTRE, AND KOERNER HALL - TICKETS HERE
WATCH / SHARE ‘MAKING OF AUBADES’ DOCUMENTARY HERE
BUY / STREAM AUBADES HERE
“From its opening notes, it whisks listeners away. On the new album from the esteemed post-classical pianist, Blais is in perpetual bloom, moved by life's beauty and nature's song.” - Exclaim!
“...aubades finds Blais conducting a 12-person ensemble, filling in his beautiful piano melodies with lush instrumentation that brings his music to new heights.” - CBC MUSIC
Photo Credit : William Arcand // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES
Since Jean-Michel Blais released aubades earlier this year, the post-classical piano icon has found his first ensemble LP as the 10th highest selling album in Canada in 2022, alongside global superstars like Adele, Taylor Swift, and the Weeknd.
aubades marked the Montreal-born musician’s transition from pianist to composer, writing for an ensemble for the first time in his career. Written during the pandemic and following a breakup, Blais used his distinctive musical voice to create a defiantly uplifting record with glistening instrumental textures and warm major tonalities. The Polaris Music Prize nominated album’s title refers to the “aubade”, a Middle Ages morning love song about lovers separating at daybreak, a dawn serenade.
Now Blais is releasing a solo piano version of aubades’ album track “amour”. He explains:
“At the antipodes of the exploded, orchestral and luminous album that aubades represents exists its antagonism: sérénades. inspired by Liszt's solo piano reductions, these serenades allow refined, nocturnal, stripped and felted versions of already existing pieces, like a soothing solitude is welcomed after a mundane celebration. but the gap is so great that, like a sleeping pill, it is even impossible for me to stay awake while listening to these soft and docile serenades.
amour begins with the loneliness of a piano longing for other instruments which will only come later while the already-known melodies are evoked, one by one, before getting carried away in a dreamlike whirlwind, resulting in the lull of minimalist repetitions ... the departed amour of a lonely waltz.”
“amour - piano” Single Art
AUBADES AVAILABLE NOW ON DOLBY ATMOS ON APPLE MUSIC HERE
WATCH / SHARE “PASSEPIED” (MUSIC VIDEO) HERE
This Summer and Fall, Jean-Michel Blais will continue supporting aubades with performances throughout Quebec and Ontario. It will include a stop at Montreal Jazz Fest on July 9 with an orchestra of 12 musicians for what promises to be a very special show as well as performances at Ottawa’s National Arts Centre and Koerner Hall in Toronto. Full tour dates can be found below and tickets are available here.
MORE ABOUT AUBADES
Jean-Michel Blais has been a celebrated figure in the post-classical piano world since the release of his critically-acclaimed debut album II in 2016. He attended Quebec’s prestigious Trois-Rivières Music Conservatory but left after two years of study, exhausted by the restraints of the traditional music curriculum. Blais then travelled widely before retraining as a special education teacher. Whilst working as a teacher, he returned to music on his own terms, rediscovering his passion through improvising on the piano. These improvisations formed the basis of a recording career that has earned him two Polaris Music Prize nominations, a #1 on the Billboard Classical chart and a Time Magazine top ten album of the year.
Despite the difficult global and personal backdrop, Blais described the time writing this album as a “fruitful moment of creativity for me. We started having hares in the park, beautiful butterflies flying everywhere. It was a time of lots of blossoming, and also a moment when I blossomed from being a pianist into a composer.” Musical ideas captured in over 500 recorded piano improvisations were transformed by Blais into 11 compositions performed by a 12-person ensemble. During the composition process, Blais collaborated with Alex Weston, former music assistant to Philip Glass. The musicians were recorded with close-up microphones, creating a richly intimate atmosphere that captures the human behind each instrument, from the mechanics of the woodwind keys to the snap of a double bass string.
Blais also consciously found himself leaning towards major tonalities, which he believes are surprisingly rare in modern classical piano music. “With this album, I was definitely responding to certain trends,” Blais reckons. “For example, the fact that the solo piano tends to sound melancholic. That’s good, but I’ve done that already, I wanted to go beyond that.”
In aubades, every instrument is given moments of expression to an extent that took the players by surprise. Blais says, “there’s often been this dominant idea in classical music that one instrument is the chief, the king of all the instruments, and the others are in the background merely supporting.” He was inspired by more democratic musical textures from the Renaissance and Middle Ages, as well as the social democratic artistic ethos of the English 19th century poet, designer and activist William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement.
Jean-Michel Blais will be taking aubades on the road in 2022. Full tour dates can be found below.
BUY / STREAM AUBADES HERE
JEAN-MICHEL BLAIS TOUR DATES
09/07/22 Montréal, QC - Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier (Festival International de Jazz de Montréal)
01/09/22 Victoriaville, QC - Le Carré 150 - Salle Les Frères-Lemaire
02/09/22 L’assomption, QC - Théâtre Hector-Charland
03/09/22 Laval, QC - Salle André-Mathieu
08/09/22 Gaspé, QC - Salle de spectacles de Gaspé
09/09/22 Carleton-sur-Mer, QC - Studio Hydro-Québec du Quai des arts
10/09/22 Rimouski, QC - Salle Desjardins-Telus
12/09/22 Sept-Îles, QC - Salle Jean-Marc Dion
13/09/22 Baie-Comeau, QC - Centre des arts de Baie-Comeau
15/09/22 Saguenay, QC - Théâtre Banque Nationale
16/09/22 Dolbeau-Mistassini, QC - Salle Desjardins Maria-Chapdelaine
17/09/22 Alma, QC - Salle Michel-Côté
22/09/22 Rivière-du-Loup, QC - Centre culturel Berger - Salle Alphonse Desjardins
24/09/22 Terrebonne, QC - Théâtre du Vieux-Terrebonne
26/09/22 Amos, QC - Théâtre des Eskers
27/09/22 La Sarre, QC - Salle de spectacles Desjardins
28/09/22 Rouyn-Noranda, QC - Théâtre du Cuivre
30/09/22 Val-d’Or, QC - Théâtre Télébec
02/10/22 Shawinigan, QC - Centre des arts de Shawinigan - Salle Philippe-Filion
04/10/22 Brossard, QC - L’Étoile Banque Nationale
05/10/22 Longueuil, QC - Théâtre de la Ville - Salle Pratt & Whitney
07/10/22 Beloeil, QC - Centre culturel de Beloeil
08/10/22 Baie-du-Febvre, QC - Théâtre Belcourt
13/10/22 Saint-Irénée, QC - Domaine forget de Charlevoix
14/10/22 St-Eustache, QC - Le Zénith Promutuel Assurance
18/10/22 Brooklyn, NY - National Sawdust
20/10/22 Ottawa, ON - National Arts Centre
20/01/23 Toronto, ON - Koerner Hall