Celine Dion appears in public for the first time since announcing her illness

Since announcing her rare neurological illness – “stiff man” syndrome – in December 2022, Celine Dion had withdrawn far from the public. The singer made a first outing on October 30 in Las Vegas, an opportunity for her to greet the Montreal Canadiens ice hockey team after the match won by the Vegas Golden Knights.

Celine Dion visited the Canadian team's locker room, as shown in a video shared by the Montreal club on X - formerly Twitter. “It’s such a pleasure to meet you,” she said to coach Martin Saint-Louis. While shaking his hand, the coach did not fail to congratulate the Quebec icon for “all his accomplishments”.

Martin Saint-Louis spoke with the star about her singing number in 1984 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal: a very young artist, still sporting a long brown mane at the time, she sang in front of Pope John Paul II. “It’s been a while. We've changed a little since then, but not that much. We always do things from the heart,” she said. After greeting the players, Céline Dion then took part in the souvenir photo game. “Don’t be shy. Come closer, you smell very good,” she said with a smile.

The head of communications for the Montreal Canadiens club, Chantal Machabée, published a photo with the star on her Instagram account. "This is completely crazy! I received comments from people all over the world. “It’s very touching to see how fans are worried about Celine Dion and are happy to see that she is doing well,” she told La Presse.

“Céline Dion was accompanied by her three sons. She spent around forty minutes with us in the locker room, she was in good shape, happy, funny, warm, we had a great time. Everyone was impressed, all the players were so happy, even moved, Chantal Machabée told our colleagues. We really experienced something very beautiful and it was reassuring to see Céline like that.”