Remembering Claude Masson, the philosopher behind the bar of L’Express

For more than four decades, Claude Masson stood behind the bar at L’Express like a fixed point in a spinning city. He would anchor the room. With a raised eyebrow, a wry smile, or the gentlest correction about your wine order, Monsieur Claude could make even a rushed weekday lunch feel like theatre.

He died on August 9, 2025 at the age of 78, after nearly 40 years in service at one of Montreal’s most iconic restaurants. And in a place that famously resists change, his absence is seismic.

Masson started at L’Express in 1983, a year after the restaurant opened on rue Saint-Denis. He was first hired as a busboy but quickly made his way to the bar, where he remained a constant presence—refined, observant, and fiercely dedicated to the craft of hospitality. For regulars, he was a man whose discretion was legendary and whose finesse never slipped, even during a Valentine’s Day rush.

“Our role is to listen, not to get involved,” he told Le Journal de Montréal in 2016. “We must keep a friendly distance, a certain mystery.”

Masson didn’t start in restaurants. He studied at Collège Brébeuf, worked briefly as a teacher, and fell into hospitality almost by accident—taking out trash at a hotel in Old Montreal just to stay employed. That job led to another, then bartending school, and eventually to the stainless-steel counter at L’Express, where he quietly helped shape what Montreal restaurant service could be: precise, warm, never showy.

“Being a good doorman is all from the neck up,” he once told Eater. “It’s all in your face.”

In interviews, Masson spoke about service the way some speak about art. Details mattered: a clean glass, a proper vinaigrette, enough bread and water at the bar. He took wine courses into his seventies just to “sharpen his senses.” He had no patience for sugar-coated liqueurs but liked a good Chablis. And he never wanted to retire.

“For many reasons, no,” he said when asked. “Work is a blessing.”

Colleagues at L’Express called him a mentor. Chefs like David McMillan credited him as an influence. Patrons remember birthdays marked with a quiet shake of a cocktail and a twinkle in the eye. There are stories about tartare that wasn’t “cooked enough,” discreet interventions when someone had too much, and evenings that ended with a sense that something right had happened, even if it was hard to name.

“We sort of feel like, at the end of the night, that we created a little paradise,” he said.

The restaurant he helped define has always operated by its own rules, and Masson—with his measured charm and deep professionalism—was part of that code. As he once put it: “We are a safe currency. When everything changes, we need comfort.”

Masson is survived by his extended family, longtime colleagues, and the generation of Montrealers who sat at his bar over the years—whether to celebrate, flirt, sulk, decompress, or just drink something well made. His memory, as L’Express wrote in its own tribute, “will live on in every glass of champagne, in the image of his effervescence.”

A public ceremony will be held at the Côte-des-Neiges Funeral Centre on September 13 at 4 p.m., with visitation from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. In lieu of flowers, the family invites donations to Aux Trois Sentiers, a palliative care organization.