'A unifier': Fans and band pay tribute to Les Cowboys Fringants singer Karl Tremblay

There was an outpouring of sadness, tears and love at Montreal's Bell Centre on Tuesday as thousands of music fans joined the remaining members of beloved folk-rock band Les Cowboys Fringants in paying tribute to lead singer Karl Tremblay.

There was an outpouring of sadness, tears and love at Montreal's Bell Centre on Tuesday as thousands of music fans joined the remaining members of beloved folk-rock band Les Cowboys Fringants in paying tribute to lead singer Karl Tremblay.

Tremblay died earlier this month at age 47 after a long bout with prostate cancer, spurring a wave of grief and affection from across the province that led Premier François Legault to offer the singer a national memorial service.

Tuesday's event featured music, as could be expected for a man whose voice was an ever-present mainstay of shows, festivals and radio airwaves for over 25 years. The crowd burst into a lengthy standing ovation when Tremblay's bandmates Marie-Annick Lépine, Jérôme Dupras and Jean-François Pauzé took the stage, delivering speeches and eventually leading the crowd in a version of the band's song "Sur mon épaule" (On my shoulder).

It was a performance reminiscent of one the band's last appearances onstage this summer, when a visibly weak Tremblay, too tired to stand, struggled through the song with the help of a 90,000-person crowd at Quebec City’s Plains of Abraham.

Pauzé, the band's main songwriter, described Tremblay on Tuesday as "my best friend, my alter ego, the one who embodied my lyrics, my songs, my melodies."

He said his friend was "eminently modest and humble" in real life, but transformed when entertaining crowds.