Hello everyone,

Although off-competition, please feel free to share your reviews/comments for the closing display here!

Trav.

That was a very good closing show from Rozzi’s Famous Fireworks and Panzera. With the peak of the vacation season and almost perfect weather conditions (nonetheless, the Ferris Wheel closed around 7:15pm due to thunderstorms in the area, apparently, so I could not have an overview of the firing site), it was certainly the most crowded fireworks evening at La Ronde this year. With the MTL-Metal concert event at the Parc Jean-Drapeau, signs posted at the entrance indicated that bus service was going to resume only once the bridge reopens, with bus going to Papineau metro station in order to help with crowd control.

Michel Lacroix hosted a two-part closing ceremony, beginning around 8:40pm. He described the program of the night, introduced competition director Martyne Gagnon and La Ronde president Janine Durette, who both did speeches. Then the Rozzi’s Famous Fireworks/Panzera crew was introduced to the audience. Then, at 9pm, Quebec singer Grégory Charles – who works with the Société des casinos du Québec and was involved in the selection of the songs for this closing show – and five musicians took the stage for a 30-minute performance, mostly international musics as well as some Quebec songs. While I am not a fan of Grégory Charles, this show was a substantive plus-value and it was very entertaining, I think the audience has strongly appreciated, and I hope a such thing could be done next year. At 9:30pm, Michel Lacroix came back to introduce those who announced the awards. A couple of minutes past 9:45pm, the floating stage gently moved towards the former location of La Pitoune flume ride.

The closing show began with a 5-minute delay, at 10:05pm. It lasts 31 minutes 30 seconds. To celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Casino de Montréal, owned and operated by the sponsor of the fireworks competition Loto-Québec, this show of the “Finale des étoiles” series was all about Quebec songs popularized since 1994. The Casino itself has a theater were many singers have performed over the years. I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed the soundtrack! It was made of 25 songs (not one per year, though) and I sang during most of them! For a couple of songs, some assembly had been done to “cut and paste” key parts of the them. However, the transitions between a couple of segments was somewhat abrupt (e.g., between Sous le vent and Fais-moi la tendresse, Le Temps des cathédrales and Et c’est pas fini...).

Almost all these songs being in French and the show designer being an American (presumably with limited capabilities in French), I had some concerns with the pyromusical design. Well, the pyromusical design was probably not the best strength of this display. For instance, I think the grandeur of Le Temps des cathédrales, from the Notre-Dame-de-Paris musical, would have required the largest shells of the show. I think the best pyromusical design was on the more instrumental segment on Kevin Parent’s Seigneur. That being said, these people know the firing site and they had an excellent technical design, including a couple of nautical products, some chase sequences – made of gerbs – along the third ramp, massive mines and comets erupting from the fifth ramp, the closest to the audience. There was also a short moment (one or two seconds) of “black sky” during the very rhythmic Et c’est pas fini which was a little anti-climactic. The finale was spectacular and though to achieve, as Tu ne sauras jamais is an entirely vocal piece, and its chute is more serene than its main part. At one point, it was hard to hear the lyrics when the finale reached its peak, but the overall ultimate part of this show was excellent and I screamed!

Panzera’s products were great, with countless multi-break shells, many changes of colours, and several vivid colours. I suppose that we say more candles than in most shows, however. Candles are a Panzera’s signature type of piece.

That was a very enjoyable show and a very good pyromusical performance to bring this 35th edition of the Montreal International Fireworks Competition to a close.

Fred

My video of this closing display can be accessed using the link below. At the beginning of the video, I also included radar imagery and some footage of the isolated thunderstorm cluster that passed closely to the South of the island of Montreal yesterday during the mid- to late-afternoon. A thunderstorm also formed over St-Hubert, where it was, indeed, observed at 7:00 p.m. EDT there:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QucHYshJtVI&feature=youtu.be

Trav.

http://montreal-fireworks.com/ReportBlog/?p=1619

Paul.