| A Conversation With Michel Rivard | |
|
Paula: What inspires your songwriting?
Michel: [long pause] It all starts somewhere in my life,
in my everyday life. Very few times I've sat down and said to
myself, "I will write a song on that particular subject." I think I did
that twice in 30 years. Most of the songs just pop up when they have
to and usually they are something that touches me in my entourage or
something that I read in the paper, something that I see, or maybe a
film will inspire me to write a song about something related to that.
It's very had for me to explain or to understand even where songs come
from. I'm still wondering where they come from and how to write them.
I'm still a student, so it's always the same excitement and always the
same anguish when it comes to write songs because after 30 years I still
don't really know how I do it. Sometimes I really have the feeling that
it won't come again, but it always comes back. I like it stay mysterious.
I don't want to know everything about the process and the mechanics of
writing songs.
Paula: When you look back over the 30 years of your career, how do
you feel you have changed as an artist and a performer between then and now?
Michel: I think - I hope - that I am more focussed than I was 30 years ago. I
think as the years went by I realized that the part that I like the most in
show business is the show part and not the business part. As the years go by,
I seem to go back to the essence of what I wanted from that craft. I seem to
go back to the simplicity of just writing songs and singing them in a very
simple way, with great musicians in an intimate setting. A few years ago I
was, like many people, when you start to grow up in that business you wish
to have more and more and more people in the audience and more guitars
around you and more sound, and big trucks to go on tour, and the tour
bus, and we all go through that. And after that you look at that and
say, "I'm not a rock star, I don't want to be a star. I want to be a
songwriter, and I want to sing my songs and have an ice everyday life
with my family and friends and have the opportunity to sing when I
want to and to write songs when I have to, and play guitar when I
want to and when I have to. So, sometimes I think I've changed,
but I'm going back to what I was before. [laughing]
Paula: Coming full circle.
Michel: Yeah, coming full circle, and just having fun. This tour I'm
doing, I'm playing with two of my best friends, and we don't have a
fixed set list. We just go along each night, and like 15 minutes
before the show I write down the set list. We have like 50 songs
we could do tonight but we will only do a few. But it's really
a sense of freedom and I'm going back to that sense of freedom I
had before Beau Dommage and before everything.
Next page > Michel Rivard: Part Five >
