Requesting backup singer info

I'm a huge fan of Canadian singer Francesca Gagnon (from Cirque du Soleil's "Alegria"), and on her website I found a picture of her posing with David Gilmour then with Pink Floyd as a whole, in what looked like a picture taken after a show. Has Gagnon ever toured with Pink Floyd as a backup singer?

I'm sure she has not.

She probably just attended a P F show and got to go backstage & meet the boys as a professional courtesy.

I thought that may have been the case. I was hoping against it, though, since there's almost nothing available that has her voice on it in the US.

Would you mind to post the photos (or the links to) here? Just out of curiosity. Thanks.

http://iquebec.ifrance.com/francescag/albumphoto.html

The pictures of her with Pink Floyd and Gilmour are the ones right below Harrison Ford. It took me a second to recognize the band in the photo, since it's so small. The reason I suspected she may have once performed with them is because she is very much off-center in the photo, not exactly typical of a picture taken with a fan (at least in my estimation). Her voice also would go perfectly with Pink Floyd's singers. Plus, she is wearing her signature white makeup, which leads me to believe that she was onstage rather than in the audience.

Or perhaps I'm simply being overly analytical.

Interesting pics. Yeah, she obviously was the performer that night. With all those celebrities, actors, etc., I was wondering if it might have been some kind of fundraiser.

Hmm, fundraiser, eh? Definitely possible. She had the white makeup on in a lot of those pictures, so that's definitely plausible. If she really did perform with PF, though, that would be just flat out amazing to see (at least for me, since no one outside of Cirque du Soleil's fanbase seems to have heard of her. Her voice deserves to be heard in the more mainstream).

It's a real shame that she's almost unknown. Her pages on iquebec haven't been updated since 2000, and her rumored new website at francescagagnon.com either doesn't exist or hasn't been opened yet. If those sources were more robust, my burning question would be far more easily answered.

Francesca is in the white makeup in that picture because she played the role of the White Singer in Alegria. I'm sure our friends Pink Floyd saw the show and got to go backstage to meet the performers.

Quote:

It's a real shame that she's almost unknown. Her pages on iquebec haven't been updated since 2000, and her rumored new website at francescagagnon.com either doesn't exist or hasn't been opened yet. If those sources were more robust, my burning question would be far more easily answered.

Her new website is on its way. (I know a lot of people, including myself, are getting impatient with it, but I have a friend who has talked to the webmaster or whatever, and it seems like it's going to be a very informative, thorough site, so hang in there!)

And it IS a shame that she's not more well-known. Her solo album Au-dela des Couleurs is available through amazon.com, and it's just amazing! I understand that she will be releasing a new album at the end of 2003. Hope that helped.

There's been a lot of buzzing around the Cirque du Soleil community about her new site opening soon, with a new album as well. I am very excited about all this! I just hope she isn't going to use the Tripod page that has the "Coming soon!" thing in 10 languages. She should have her own domain.

Au-Dela des Couleurs is amazing indeed, but I couldn't get it through Amazon. I had to resort to eBay. But man, that album changed my approach to music completely. I went from Rush and Dream Theater as my biggest influences to Cirque and Francesca. Complete 180!

As for PF actually attending a showing of Alegria, that's a possibility I had not considered. Somehow I doubt that every one of them is into Cirque du Soleil. Then again, I don't really know anything about PF outside of their music.

That IS a complete 180! Can't say my musical tastes have done the same--I'm always listening to something that no one's heard of! Mainly folky-type stuff. I bought the album because I fell head over heels for her voice, but luckily it turns out she's a remarkable musical talent as well as having an unparalleled voice. She surrounds herself with excellent writers/musicians/etc, and it really shows. I don't know if you know or not, but she has two albums that she did in the 80's (and they were just that--CRIMINALLY 80's!! She just seems to get better and better as time goes by). I've got both; they're not that great, but they're interesting little novelties to have!
Most of those pictures are taken with other music people, so I'm sure if they see a show, they want to meet the singers and musicians. When I first got into Cirque, it was for the amazing acts, but I didn't realize that they had such good music. Sometimes I think the singers get more of a workout than the acrobats do!

Yes, I've heard of "Magie" and "Francesca." There was actually a review of one of them in the most recent Fascination! newsletter. I'm going up to Montreal with my chorus class in May to compete, so if I find myself to be in any record stores, I'll have to look for her first two albums, just to have them. I wouldn't expect too much from them, though, since she was very much an emerging new talent at the time, with little experience.

The first thing I noticed about Cirque was the fantastic music. The first thing I bought was the Alegria soundtrack, not the DVD. I just had to have the music first. To me, the acrobatics support the music, since I know nothing about physical activity outside of playing bass onstage!