Boogie days

>> Piknic Électronik celebrates five
years of partying in the park

THE MAN...: Piknic partygoers

by JACK OATMON

It’s precisely the kind of thing that makes Montreal the cultural Mecca that it is. It’s hard to even imagine it functioning, let alone being accepted, in many other major cities, given the commonplace conceptions about electronic music and liability issues that naturally arise with outdoor events. But in five years, Piknic Électronik has evolved from a couple hundred people dancing in the park into a weekly tradition for thousands of festive revellers of all ages, running like clockwork with hardly a perceptible hiccup in the process. Every Sunday afternoon of the summer, and during a few highly anticipated off-season events, Piknic Électronik hosts some of the best in electronic dance music at Place de l’Homme in Parc Jean-Drapeau.

“Pascal Lefebvre, one of the four musketeers, was visiting indoor locations on Île Ste-Hélène,” says Nicolas Cournoyer, one of the event’s organizers. “When he passed by our site, saw the Alexander Calder sculpture, the view of Montreal and the green spaces, he got a crush on it. Then he got together Michel Quintal, Louis-David Loyer and I. We developed the concept and then proposed the project to Parc Jean-Drapeau. Luckily, they were keen to go on with it.”

Piknic has since grown to attendances of up to 3,180 visitors a week. The events themselves in turn help enrich the very cultural setting that makes them possible, according to Cournoyer. “I think that the city of Montreal is pretty happy about the event and its impact,” he says. “More and more, Parc Jean-Drapeau is being recognized for its real value. It’s a gorgeous park only minutes from downtown that was, until recently, underestimated. Nowadays, more people are going there to cycle or rollerblade or simply relax. And I think that the Piknic helped that a lot with a weekly average of more than 2,000 people who, at the same time, are discovering Calder’s magnificent structure, ‘The Man.’”

Cournoyer also points out that the events themselves are incentive for more people to come visit Montreal. “The event is getting more well-known even outside of Montreal, so now we have a lot of tourists who include Piknic in their activities when they visit Montreal.”

To celebrate its fifth season, Piknic is hosting a special, two-day program this Fête St-Jean weekend with a diverse set of guest DJs and musicians. Saturday will feature DJ sets by Men (JD Samson and Johanna Fateman of le Tigre), locals Frigid and Nu Ravers on the Block as well as a special edition of the iPod Battle. Sunday will feature Josh Wink, Fred Everything and Millimetrik.

At Parc Jean-Drapeau on Saturday and
Sunday, June 23–24, 1–9 p.m., $5 ($7
after 5 p.m., free for kids under 12)