Nathalie Matteau

New singer from old times

Small, frail and from different times. That's the impression the Canadian singer Nathalie Matteau gives. About two years ago, she came to the Netherlands for the first time. This year she wants to settle here for good, to carry out her creative credo: a return to the artistic twenties and thirties of the previous century. With her powerful voice she is bound to be successful.

by Rinus van der Heijden

An acquaintance of mine had a tip for me at a party: “Do you know Nathalie Matteau? You don't? You really should listen to her.” It was one of the many tips we music critics keep getting all the time. A few days later there was a cd in the letterbox: 'Bloody Hands in Love' by Nathalie Matteau & Les Hommes Perdus. To call it a golden tip would perhaps be a bit strong, but it could certainly be called a good one. For the Canadian combines an intriguing voice with a style that seemed extinct, but is being revived by her now.

The repertoire on 'Bloody Hands in Love' and also that of her stage performances, is mainly rooted in the twenties and thirties of the twentieth century, when in Germany the music of Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht was in its heydays. Nathalie Matteau adds contemporary influences to it, like those of sweltering nightclubs, jazz, cabaret, circus oom-pah and sometimes even classical music. Elements of singing mavericks like Tom Waits and Jacques Brel can also be heard. Some even say she has a touch of Edith Piaf, but Matteau takes more after this legendary singer in appearance and performance than in voice. 'Bloody Hands in Love' contains twelve magnificent songs, in English, French, German and some in Dutch. 'Chansons noires' (dark songs), she calls them. Her low voice colours all songs, and it is striking how beautifully she can reach the high notes. She sounds almost fragile then, trembling, yet always firm.

The gloomy side of life is what appeals to the Canadian singer. “I am drawn to the darker side of life”, she says. “I write my own lyrics and music. The lyrics are often 'damned', they're about death, love, deceit, jealousy, farewells and loneliness. In this darkness, there is beauty. People recognize that. I rarely read something light hearted, but I do love life, because otherwise I wouldn't be doing what I am doing. I put cheerfulness, energy and vitality in the music, even though it is all set in minor. There is also passion, not only despair. My lyrics may be sad, they do offer consolation.”

Oisterwijk The latter is evident during shows. Last autumn, Nathalie Matteau and her band gave a concert in Tiliander, a theatre in the town of Oisterwijk. It was one of those gigs where technically everything went wrong. But the music stood firm and touched the audience, who afterwards approached her in great numbers. “After a show, mainly women come up to me”, she says. “They recognize themselves in me.” Smiling friendly, she made conversation with everybody, in her best Dutch. Dutch, the language she is so eager to learn, because after some travelling back and forth from Canada, she wants to settle in the Netherlands. In her eyes a beautiful place in Europe, where her musical roots lie, judging by her repertoire.

“At a young age, I was already interested in the twenties and thirties”, Nathalie Matteau recalls. “The years in between the world wars were sophisticated, creative in music, art and fashion. Everything was new in that era. I remember seeing the film 'Der Blaue Engel' (The Blue Angel) on television, the face of Marlene Dietrich, wow!” It is, therefore, obvious she learned about Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht, songwriters of dark and almost indefinable music that heralded a new era and closed one that was definitely over. Talking about Weill and Brecht, one cannot escape Lotte Lenya, their 'house singer', who, with her diffuse and almost ominous sound, pushed the German 'Liedkunst' (art song) between the world wars, to a unique level. The opera 'Aufsteig und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny' (Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny) is what Nathalie Matteau must have listened to very often, otherwise one cannot explain how she manages to approach the nihilism of this music so closely.

The atmosphere Nathalie Matteau creates is shaped by the band 'Les Hommes Perdus' (The Lost Men), which she has gathered around her. Not just thanks to the individual qualities of the musicians, but also because of the choice of instruments. Besides Kees Swanenberg on drums, there is Michaël Breukers on accordion and piano, Leon van Egmond on trombone, alto trombone and harmonica, Peter Dupont on bass and alto saxophone and Erik Potters on tuba.

Montreal Technically, Nathalie Matteau barely has any schooling as a singer. At age sixteen, she did two years of classical training at the École de Musique Vincent d'Indy in Montreal. After that, she auditioned for a classical education at McGill University in Montreal, where she was admitted. "After a year I left. I soon questioned that classical singing really was my cup of tea. I was listening to pop music and I was interested in acting. I just didn't feel free enough in classical music. It was a good education though: I still use things I practised there, like my breathing technique. Moreover, I still benefit from the discipline I learned there."

After she left university, she went on to do all sorts of things, like singing and acting. “I was so impressed by the classical world, that it took me a while to feel confident. For me, acting was a kind of compensation for singing.” She was, for instance, involved in the film 'Heist' with Gene Hackman, as the stand-in for the actress Rebecca Pidgeon. Eventually, she chose to devote herself to a career in singing. She developed her repertoire in Canada, with a focus on European music.

No wonder she chose to set off for the old world almost two years ago. By the end of this month (February 2010, ed.) she will return to the Netherlands for the fifth time, perhaps to stay forever. The first time she came over was in May 2008, after booking a number of shows herself. The singer got in touch with the band 'Straf', from the city of 's-Hertogenbosch, more particular with its drummer Kees Swanenberg, from Oisterwijk. He recommended some musicians, she contacted them via the internet, sent them her music and things started rolling. Since then, the province of Noord Brabant has been her home base whenever she is in our country. “After the Netherlands, I want to go for Germany, France and Belgium”, she dreams aloud.

Monkeyman Matteau does ten to twelve shows each time she is in the Netherlands. “I do a lot myself: managing, booking - though recently Monkeyman (a booking agency, ed.) has been taking care of that – producing my cd’s, leading the band.” The arrangements however, come about in cooperation with her musicians. “I deliver the lyrics, the melody, the chords and explain what I want. Together we work on the arrangements. The music business is a men's world, but I never think about that. I focus on things I find interesting and I do what every musician, man or woman, must do: work. I never think of myself as a woman in music, I am just a musician. I do enjoy working with men, though. So delightfully simple!”

The cd 'Bloody Hands in Love' is distributed by Sonic Rendez-vous.

www.nathaliematteau.com www.myspace.com/lenyab www.monkeyman.nl www.sonicrendezvous.com

This (cover and feature) article was published in the Dutch magazine 'Brabant Cultureel', February 2010. Translation by Kees Swanenberg and Rachel van Dijk

photo © Brendan van den Breuken