Category: Music

A century on, French singer and anarchist Georges Brassens still hits the right note

This story first featured in the Spotlight on France podcast: listen here

With his pipe, polo-necked sweater, moustache and cat on lap, the image of Brassens is more cudly uncle than new-man.

As Joann Sfar, curator of a major Brassens exhibition in 2011, has pointed out, “most of his songs are about naked women, death and cats”.

Brassens At the Beach

The hit song “Brave Margot” featured two of those favourite themes, with Margot drawing in big crowds by removing her bodice to breast-feed her pet.

Brassens excelled at taking aspects of ordinary French life – women, sex, death, religion, the military, migration … and, yes, cats … and transforming them into theatre through an unsurpassed use of wordplay.

He’s been described as a French Woodie Guthrie – a working class singer and guitarist who shunned stardom. He was also a self-proclaimed anarchist with a distate for the military and the clergy.

Brassens plays for a homeless man in Paris
Brassens plays for a homeless man in Paris Robert Doisneau

Bad reputation

He wrote 150 songs in his 40-year career.

Les copains d’abord, about friends playing with boats on a lake, L’Auvergnat, about the importance of generosity, and Quand on est con, are classics and feature in many a French family reunion or office party.

Some of his songs offended established values in early fifties France. Le Gorille – a song against the death penalty involving a rampaging gorilla desperate to lose its virginity and who “takes” the judge in the end, was banned on its release in 1952.

Mauvaise Reputation (Bad reputation), in which he defends individual liberties – including the freedom to desert the army, which he himself did in 1944 – was also deemed unfit for the public.

Out of time

Part of Brassens’ staying power resides in the timelessness of his songs, something he worked hard to achieve.

“I can’t use the word ‘automobile’ in my songs,” he told French public radio in 1970, “it will fix the song in a certain period.”

His superficially-simple refrains, accompanied by guitar, turn out to be very complex. But that hasn’t put off hordes of non-French speakers from taking up the challenge.

“Brassens has been translated into 82 languages and dialects, it’s enormous,” Bernard Lonjon, author of several books on Brassens told RFI.

He’s the most re-recorded French artist in the world.

Hesitant stage debut

Brassens’ entry into the pantheon of the French chanson got off to a sweaty start.

As a teenager he fled to Paris from his home town of Sète on the Mediterranean coast after a conviction for petty theft.

He first lodged with his aunt and then lived for many years in a house without electricity or indoor plumbing with a couple of friends –  Marcel and Jeanne – as a threesome. Continue reading “A century on, French singer and anarchist Georges Brassens still hits the right note” →

Pierre De Gaillande still singing Brassens

Nearly ten years ago, musician Pierre de Gaillande took upon the challenging task to translate George Brassens songs.

The project has seen strong support from the extended family of Brassens admirers and former collaborators, including Joel Favreau, Brassens’ last guitarist, who has played a number of shows Pierre de Gaillande in France and the US.

Les Rita Mitsouko “Marcia Baila”

“Marcia Baïla” is a 1984 song recorded by the French duo Rita Mitsouko. It was the third single from their first album, Rita Mitsouko, and was released in April of that year. Dedicated to a dancer with the band who died in 1981, this song was a big hit both in France and abroad and can be considered as being one of the band’s signature songs.

Francis Cabrel: “People have carried me so much, loved me so much, I can begin to reveal myself”

by Eric Bureau | Google translation 

On October 17, 2021 at 19:10

The V of victory and a big smile. We have rarely seen Francis Cabrel so relaxed while climbing on stage, this Thursday, October 14 at the Zénith in Strasbourg (Bas-Rhin). And also at ease for 2h10 in front of 3,500 fans, first seated and attentive then standing and fervent.

At 67, the artist takes advantage. His “Trobador Tour”, with four musicians and three singers in total harmony, is one of his best tours . And his latest album, “À l’Avenir Revenant”, is a critical and commercial success, with 250,000 sales in the past year.

Behind the scenes, too, we meet a still rare but peaceful man. Doubly vaccinated, he announces to us without mask the release on December 3 of a double live – 2 CDs and 4 vinyls – with two unreleased studio songs. On tour since June, he also tells us about his wish to take a musical break in 2022, to devote himself to other writings.

First of all the question that everyone is asking after your video posted two weeks ago: has the municipality of Astaffort found a doctor?

FRANCIS CABREL . I do not have the impression. I am not often in the village at the moment, but I have not received any good news… It is not because we are making fuss that people are running. The neighboring village also put up a banner: Let’s look for two doctors . We must be the x-thousandth town to suffer from this.

Why you, so discreet, did you agree to appear in this video?

Our medical center is functioning very well, it just lacks a general practitioner. The one who remains at retirement age and continues to troubleshoot. It was he who asked me if I wanted to appear to help. The locals had already written the script. It only took me thirty minutes when they spent several days there.

Is it a recent problem?

It has been stretching for three, four years. When I was elected (from 1989 to 2004), we never experienced this shortage. We even had up to two practices and four doctors. Municipalities should pay doctors, but that implies a budget that many do not have.

How is your tour going?

We are in the middle of the ford, a little over thirty dates out of sixty. Past my usual worries, which do not get better with age, my fears of forgetting the texts, my allergy to long journeys, things are going very well (he smiles) . We are reopening many rooms, like here in Strasbourg, and the reception is great everywhere.

You are more relaxed on stage …

It’s true. This is one of my favorite tours. It makes me happy that people hear such musicians and the work of the choristers is remarkable. It’s successful but, in the spirit, it’s like inviting them to a rehearsal.

Francis Cabrel at the Zénith de Strasbourg, Thursday 14 October, one of the concerts of his Trobador Tour.
Francis Cabrel at the Zénith in Strasbourg, Thursday October 14, one of the concerts of his Trobador Tour. LP / Jean-Baptiste Quentin

What are you going to do after the last date, December 18th?

For now, there are few things planned for 2022. In June, we will do the tour that had been canceled in Canada, then the few summer festivals postponed because of the Covid or bad weather. My producer has some ideas in his head, but I’m quite tempted to do nothing in between. A tour is tiring. And we have to move on.

A new album?

No. In any case, not right away. I remain on the good impression of it. And I want to write in other forms. It tempts me to make a book, I have a few leads. I saw that Laurent (Voulzy) had written one on cathedrals. It’s interesting.

We have just celebrated the 70 years of Jean-Jacques Goldman. Do you sometimes think about quitting yourself?

But all the time! I’ve been thinking about it since my first album in 1977. The day after its release, I said: I ‘m quitting . In my opinion, Jean-Jacques quit too early . Like him, I wonder not to make the album and the tour too much. I have made fourteen albums, several thousand concerts, there is still a repetitive effect. For me, it’s soon.

Why did you add two unreleased songs from 2020 to your next live album?

I didn’t put them on my last album because I didn’t want it to be too long. But I regretted it. One of the two, “What to say”, is based on a cute note from my six-year-old granddaughter Mona. After observing a dog and a bird, she asked her mother: Are they talking to each other? My daughter Aurélie told me about it and I embroidered, reflected on us, who have somewhat lost the purity, the poetry of children. Their company is regenerating, refreshing.

As time goes by, you talk a little more about yourself …

Yes. On the album, I even talked about my father. People have carried me so much, loved me so much, that I can begin to reveal myself.

But not on social networks, from which you are absent… Why?

As Alain Souchon says, we were famous at the right time. We went through a simple and golden period. Now it gets more complicated with social networks. There are a lot of benefits to be had but also pitfalls. I used my daughter’s Facebook to share my songs while in lockdown , but I don’t have a strong enough opinion to feed Twitter.

Your last participation in the Enfoirés dates back to 2010. Will you come back?

I was asked again recently but I said: No, excuse me . I am old enough to retire from the “Enfoirés”. Coming back now, I would feel less in tune. I remember discussions with Jean-Jacques and Maxime Le Forestier, where we said to ourselves that the ideal would be to make room for young people. It’s done, and it’s perfect.

Source: Francis Cabrel: “People have carried me so much, loved me so much, I can begin to reveal myself”