The first tine I heard a Robert Charlebois record I really wasn’t sure what he was singing about. Even with the lyrics in front of me

It was 1968 and I was in a high school French class. The teacher thought we should hear and study this new music. It was in French, and then again, it wasn’t.

Charlebois was the first musician to record in joual, the common French of Quebec. Purists poked fun at it but the people embraced Charlebois and made him a Quebec superstar. (His first visit to France as I recall did not go well, but eventually the French too caught in to the power of the music )

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Robert Charlebois was a cultural force in Quebec. One made perhaps more powerful by his refusal to engage in the political debates of the day. Most Quebec entertainers chose sides on the question of whether Quebec should be an independent country. Charlebois just made music.

At 78 he is still an icon, known to generations even as the musical output has slowed. Admittedly those who come to his shows are mostly an older demographic – but the music remains fresh.

Fifty years ago, he could draw more than 100,000 people to a show. His energetic explorations of rock and roll (as well as other genres) took his audiences on a sometimes surreal musical voyage. He was Charlebois – a genre all to his own.

Like like many of his contemporaries, Charlebois has no longer tours incessantly. After all, he is 78. He probably doesn’t need the money from shows – but performing is in his blood. Last month he was in Ottawa for a performance at the National Arts Centre. Mindful that I might not have another chance to see him (and my wife saying she never had), I bought tickets to the show.

This show was billed as Robert in Charleboiscope, a multimedia extravaganza. It had the feeling of a farewell tour, with lots of video clips from the 1960s and 1970s when he (and we) were so much younger.

His voice was strong. The music remains timeless. I felt like I was back in high school.

Given the retrospective aspect to the show, the emphasis was on the familiar, but he didn’t play all the hits. The man released his first album in 1965 – it would be impossible to play all the hits in a 90 minute show. There were a few of my favorites that weren’t included, including several  that I recall as having had major chart success.

In the past fifty years I have probably seen Charlebois in concert a half dozen times or so, though not recently. This show was extra special.

About two thirds of the way through the show a grey-haired woman walked onto the stage, microphone in hand. It was Louise Forester, an 80-year-old musical legend who made an album with Charlebois in 1968. To see them sing together, something I had never had the opportunity for before, was extremely emotional.

These days I find that I am increasingly drawn to the music of my younger days, artists from the 1960s and 1970s. I don’t know if it is an awareness of my own mortality or the realization that these musicians are mortal too – the odds are they may not be able to perform much longer. Age has a way of catching up to all of us, even icons.

Which explains why I am going to see Rod Stewart later this summer (for the first time). And the Doobie Brothers (first time in about 40 years). I figure I might not have another opportunity.

The funny thing about these shows is that even though the performers have grey hair and look their ages, somehow they make me feel younger. Maybe that’s why I go.

Most people reading this have never heard of Robert Charlebois before. So I’m ending this with a couple of live videos from a show last weekend in Montreal. You don’t need to understand French to appreciate the music.