Six additional concert dates have been added to the 10 already announced for singer Céline Dion's return to the stage in Paris in September and October, prompting a rush from fans for pre-sales. But as general ticket sales open on Friday, organisers are urging spectators to be careful of scams.
Canadian diva Céline Dion is planning a five-week residency beginning from 12 September, with performances on Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays.
The additional dates on 18 and 25 September, as well as 2, 9, 16 and 17 October bring the number of concerts scheduled in Paris to 16.
Dion, originally from Quebec, Canada, announced the news on her 58th birthday on 30 March, via video and messages projected on to the Eiffel Tower.
Her much-awaited return to the stage comes after six years away from the public eye, due to the Covid-19 pandemic and her ongoing health issues. She has been living with Stiff Person Syndrome, a rare and incurable neurological disorder, since 2022.
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"Paris has always held great importance for her, and the city provides an ideal setting to mark the beginning of this new chapter in her career. She’s returning to her roots," Frédéric Longuépée, CEO of the Paris La Défense Arena where Dion's concerts will be staged, told French news agency AFP.
Dion had planned to perform at this venue during her "Courage World Tour" in 2019, before it was cancelled due to the pandemic initially, and then Dion's own health issues.
Located in Paris's business district, just outside of the capital, the venue has a maximum capacity of approximately 45,000 seats, which was tested in 2024 with Taylor Swift's shows.
But for Dion's residency, the floor layout will be altered, with a seated section that will reduce the total capacity to around 30,000 seats per night, Longuépée explained.
The new concert dates prompted a surge of fans eager to enter a giant lottery granting access to three days of advance ticket sales which began on Tuesday, ahead of the general sale on Friday.
Entries for the lottery granting access to these presales are estimated to be in the millions worldwide, but no official figures have been released. The first people selected for the pre-sales were notified on Monday.
Faced with scammers attempting to exploit the event, Longuépée reiterated the importance of using official ticket sales websites Ticketmaster, AXS and Fnac Spectacles.
"We will be extremely vigilant, including filing complaints with the Paris Judicial Court, to prosecute anyone engaging in fraudulent activities," he warned.
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"What makes this event so special is that it’s generating genuine global interest. We’ve seen a huge number of registrations coming in from China, Australia, Canada, Latin America and all over Europe, of course, with phenomenal demand and interest throughout France," noted Peter Quinlan of AXS, the company responsible for collecting pre-sale registrations.
To combat the use of bots, the company asked those registering for their bank details to ensure they were indeed "real humans".
"The idea is to give the most loyal fans a fair chance to get tickets, and to prevent bad actors and malicious individuals from getting hold of them," Quinlan said, adding that some hacking organisations were not trying to obtain tickets but rather to "sow chaos and create problems".
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The Paris region is set to profit from the Canadian star's time in the capital, and the resulting influx of visitors.
Alexandra Dublanche, vice-president of the Île-de-France Region told Franceinfo on Monday that she expected "between €180 million and €300 million economic impact".
She estimates the concerts will attract "around 450,000 spectators, 30 percent of whom will be international". She said she hoped the concert-goers would extend their stay in the Paris area.
"We're going to try to target this audience. It's up to us to capitalise on this so that there are maximum economic benefits for all the Île-de-France region."
(with newswires)
