Richard Desjardins
Richard Desjardins is a Québécois folk singer and film director.
Career
Desjardins and his friends formed the country rock ensemble Abbitibbi in the 1970s; Desjardins played piano, guitar, and sang. When the group disbanded in 1982, Desjardins pursued a solo career. He released a number of solo albums, including Tu m'aimes-tu in 1990 and Boom Boom, which appeared on the RPM 100 Top Albums list in 1998.Desjardins also found work scoring films, especially documentaries. This involvement in the Quebec film industry even led him to co-direct a number of feature-length documentaries. He was known for his environmental activism, especially with regards to protecting forests from over-exploitation, and to promote this he and Robert Monderie created the documentary film Forest Alert in 1999. In 2007 Desjardins, again with Monderie, created The Invisible Nation , a documentary about the Algonquin nation in Quebec.
Desjardins went on tour in 2013, promoting his album L'existoire; after that he made occasional live appearances, including the 2018 Festival guitares du monde in Abitibi.
In 2017 a group of singers came together at Steve Jolin's Rouyn-Noranda record company to record Chanter Richard Desjardins, a tribute album of Desjardins' songs.
He was profiled in Lisette Marcotte's 2019 documentary film The Last Nataq .
Discography
Albums- 1981-Boom Town Café
- 1988-Les derniers humains
- 1989-Le trésor de la langue
- 1990-Tu m'aimes-tu
- 1992-Les derniers humains
- 1994-Chaude était la nuit
- 1998-Boom Boom
- 2003-Kanasuta
- 2011-L'existoire
- 1993-Richard Desjardins au Club Soda
- 1996-Desjardins Abbittibbi Live
- 1990-Le Party
- Kanasuta - Là où les diables vont danser
Filmography
- 1977 - A Raging Disaster by Desjardins and Robert Monderie
- 1978 - Firefly , by Desjardins and Robert Monderie
- 1999 - Forest Alert by Desjardins and Robert Monderie
- 2007 - The Invisible Nation by Desjardins and Robert Monderie
- 2011 - The Hole Story by Desjardins and Robert Monderie
Music for films and theater
- À double tour, by Marie Cadieux, 1994The Party by Pierre Falardeau, 1990
- La Nuit avec Hortense, by Jean Chabot, 1988
- Noranda, by Robert Monderie and Daniel Corvec, 1984
- Le doux partage by Sylvie van Brabant, 1983
- Depuis que le monde est monde by Sylvie van Brabant, 1981Blue Winter by André Blanchard, 1978
- Beat by André Blanchard, 1976
- Composed music for and was musical director of ”Têtes rondes et têtes pointues“ by Bertold Brecht, at the 1986 Brecht International Festival in Toronto.Malartic, 2024