Stéphane Venne has passed away. He died on January 17, 2025, at the age of 83. After receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award (Prix Excellence) at the 2011 SOCAN Gala, he received the Cultural Impact Award in 2016 for his classic “C’est le début d’un temps nouveau,” a sublime portrait of its time and a timeless hymn to the hope of renewal.
And that’s just one of the countless number of unforgettable songs he brought to Québec audiences, and the Francophonie as a whole – as sung by exceptional performers like Renée Claude, Isabelle Pierre, Emmanuëlle, Nicole Martin, Pierre Lalonde, and more recently, Marie-Hélène Thibert. Nine of his songs have achieved the status of SOCAN Classics: the aforementioned « C’est le début d’un temps nouveau », « Le temps est bon », « Attention la vie est courte », « Et c’est pas fini », « Le monde à l’envers », « Le tour de la Terre », « Tu trouveras la paix », « Les enfants de l’avenir », and « C’est notre fête aujourd’hui ».
Caring for the professional fate of his songwriting peers, he was an ardent advocate for copyright. He also sat on the Board of Directors of CAPAC, one of SOCAN’s predecessor organizations, and presided over said Board in 1977 and 1978. He was similarly involved in the founding of the Société professionnelle des auteurs et des compositeurs du Québec (SPACQ), and sat on its first Board of director – alongside founders Diane Juster, Luc Plamondon, and Lise Aubut – in 1981.
Among his many recognitions, he was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2017, at which time he delivered a very touching speech. Here’s a short excerpt: “If there’s one thing I feel strongly about tonight, it’s the message [that this recognition] sends out, namely that if you don’t have a [singing] voice, and don’t want to get onstage, but you can play the piano and know how to write, you can still be happy. You can still make a good living. And there’s a way to make a mark just by writing, provided you have a lifelong alliance with artists and singers.”
Who better to celebrate his memory, and grasp the magnitude of the imprint that his words and melodies have left on our hearts, than some of his friends and close collaborators, as well as some of the recipients of the SPACQ Foundation’s Stéphane Venne Award – presented each year since 2018 to those who, like him, put themselves at the service of performers to carry their words and music.
Here are their testimonies:
PIERRE HUET
“It’s always difficult to talk about someone you started by being a fan of before becoming their friend. I grew up during the era, in Québec, where you had ‘variety’ singers such as Louvain, Lalonde, and Lautrec on one side and the ‘chansonniers’ like Vigneault, Leclerc, and Leyrac on the other, and you had to choose one or the other. It was a detestable choice.
“Then, up popped Stéphane Venne, a tad awkwardly, with his too-literal adaptation of ‘Penny Lane’ for Les Sinners. I would be remiss not to mention his song ‘Un jour un jour,’ written for Expo 67 – which, to me, still sounded a bit tame and academic.
Those were the prelude to the true, pure, and great Stéphane Venne, whose songs combined the melodic sense of the best pop music, and the literary quality of wordy ‘chansons.’
“I’ll leave it to others to list, analyze, and above all, share with us the best of Stéphane Venne, but I’ll still add my two cents. I believe the best songs are those that manage, paradoxically, to surprise and reassure us all at once. A sentence like ‘J’ai deux amis qui sont aussi mes amoureux’ [freely: ‘I’ve got two friends who are also my lovers,’ from Venne’s song ‘Le temps est bon’] is reassuring, because it makes us feel like life has meaning. Yet, as in the chorus of the gorgeous ‘Les enfants de l’avenir,’ he surprises us by taking us in a completely different melodic direction.
“This gift for surprising and reassuring us was one of Stéphane Venne’s talents, which he shared with Burt Bacharach, whom I’m certain he admired. Another one of his talents was finding happiness and beauty everywhere: in the Plouffe household, in the new time to come, and even on Rue de la Montagne.
“My favourite song, since I guess we all need to pick one? ‘Il était une fois des gens heureux.’
When taking in such a person, I could not be Stéphane’s friend; I could only be an admirer. So long, my friend.”
DIANE JUSTER
“WRITING FOR OTHERS… such was Stéphane Venne’s greatest talent. Making the most beautiful voices sing. It’s the trade he chose after university, and the hits followed… Then one day, the reality of this beautiful trade befell him! He had to survive… This great songwriter stopped writing to earn a living! That’s the reality of our trade. Thank you, Stéphane Venne, for helping us create SPACQ in 1981, and for having served as an example to us by constantly advocating for creators.”
FRANÇOIS DOMPIERRE
“When he had an idea in mind, few would be able to make him change his mind. It wasn’t stubbornness, though: when Stéphane made a decision, he weighed the implications and consequences, and knew how to convince us, with proof to back it up. He readily admitted that he could be uncompromising, scathing, even – it was in his nature. Yet, this rough side hid treasure troves of tenderness. One only needs to listen to the lyrics of his greatest songs to become convinced of this. I had the pleasure of working with him at the very start of our respective careers. I appreciated his precision and he loved my whimsical side! As creators, we had two distinct visions, but every time we collaborated, we spoke in unison.”
NELSON MINVILLE (Prix Stéphane Venne 2018)
“In 2018, I was honoured to become the first recipient of the Prix Stéphane Venne awarded by SOCAN at the SPACQ Gala. Stéphane Venne, an inspiration forever. Thank you for your trailblazing. Et c’est pas fini!”
Je t’ai vu faire lever le jour
En chantant des chansons d’amour
Je t’ai vu monter vers le ciel
Car tu as dans la tête bien mieux que des ailes
[Freely:
I saw you make daylight break
By singing love songs
I saw you rise towards the heavens
Because your mind is much better than wings]
ÈVE DÉZIEL (Prix Stéphane Venne 2024)
“I’m 10 years old, and the song ‘Un jour un jour’ is playing non-stop on the radio. I know it by heart. To me, it’s a Donald Lautrec song, since I had no idea of the existence of songwriting as a trade. At 16, I bought Renée Claude’s Greatest Hits double LP. They contained 20 songs. Side 1 opened with ‘C’est notre fête aujourd’hui,’ Side 4 closed with ‘Sais-tu que je t’aime depuis longtemps.’ There, under one of my favourite songs, was a name: S. Venne.
“What a talent he had to describe ordinary life. What a talent he had to compose rich and complex music that you can still hum after hearing once. Such an amalgamation of beauty, singularity, and simplicity is a high form of art. A masterpiece of craftsmanship. If someone told me that I would one day receive an award named after him, I wouldn’t have believed it. What a gift, and I accepted with a ton of disbelief and humility.
“On this January morning, it’s the chorus of “Il était une fois des gens heureux” that I’m listening to, over and over.”
Il ne faut pas chercher à savoir
Où s’en va le temps
Il s’en va pareil aux glaces dans le Saint-Laurent
On fait toute la vie
Semblant qu’on va durer toujours
Pareils au fleuve dans son cours
Et c’est peut-être rien que pour ça
Qu’on fait des enfants
[Freely:
There’s no point in trying to figure out
Where time goes
It flows away like the ice on the Saint-Lawrence
We spend our whole life
Pretending we’re never going to die
Just as the river flows
Maybe that’s the only reason
Why we have children]
“Thank you, Stéphane Venne. Your legacy is as magnificent and vast as the land where you were born.”
FRÉDÉRICK BARON (Prix Stéphane Venne 2019)
“It was at the beginning of the 2000s that the emerging lyricist I was first crossed paths with the legendary Stéphane Venne, as we worked on Marie-Élaine Thibert’s first album. That project marked a kind of re-birth for him, while, for me, it was truly “’le début d’un temps nouveau’ [freely ‘the beginning of a new era’ referencing the title of one of Venne’s biggest hits] because the album’s phenomenal success launched my career. Obviously, the album’s success can largely be attributed to Mr. Venne.
“His writing is crystal clear and precise, yet poetic, and he’s remained an ideal to follow. Let’s just say I owe a lot to him. I was profoundly honoured and moved when the SPACQ Foundation presented me with the award that bears his name in 2019.
“There’s one song in my playlist that I always listen to over and over with the volume cranked up: ‘Le temps est bon.’ Its subtly transgressive lyrics and luminous melody always put a smile on my face, and bring me a ‘joie de vivre’ that, unfortunately, our era has perhaps lost a little.”
GAËLE (Prix Stéphane Venne 2021)
“Mr. Venne, you are one of the finest examples of all the skills required to write a song that sounds good. Singer-songwriter for yourself and others, ‘hitmaker’ at the service of the song, you understand the importance of the communion between sounds and words. From the flavour of the perfect blend when the right melody meets the right voice, to the boundless beauty between classical and pop, your legacy nourishes my creative work every day: a ‘we’ to make the ‘I’ grow, the past to better believe in the future? ‘Singing to live,’ therefore.
“Thanks to the musical path paved with your abundant and immortal repertoire, you have enabled the immigrant that I’ve been for 25 years now to discover a territory, to learn about a country, and above all, to allow myself to grow roots so deep in your culture that I’m humbly trying to become part of it.
“It is humming ‘Quand le temps tournera au beau,’ armed with my pencil and piano, that I’m going back to playing with sounds.”
AMAY LAONI (Prix Stéphane Venne 2022)
“The first thing that struck me when I met Stéphane Venne was that he was a child at heart. Even after all that time, and with all of his experience, I sensed in him a deep curiosity to learn. I also realized that here was a man who knew how to stand his ground.
“It’s the song ‘Et c’est pas fini’ that immediately comes to mind when I think of Mr. Venne. It resonates deeply with me. Between lightness and depth, it’s up to us to choose the message we take away from it. When Emmanuëlle sings ‘Nous sommes bientôt ce qui a de plus beau dans le monde’ [Freely: ‘We’ll soon be what’s most beautiful in the world’], I hear it as a rallying cry to believe. Believe in humans, believe in our capacity to give life to what’s most beautiful in us and in the world.
“Mr. Venne, what’s on the other side of the clouds is just a new beginning. I sincerely wish you the most beautiful new beginning.”
STEVEE MARIN (Prix Stéphane Venne 2020)
“We’ve lost a songwriter whose talent and dedication helped champion ‘la chanson Francophone’ in a sensitive and melodic way over many decades. His melodies will remain one of my major influences in composition. Rest in peace, Mr. Venne.”