The Soundtracks of Our Lives

Over thé years, I have collected CDs as diverse as Brazilian samba music, Argentine tangos, South African jazz, Caribbean reggae and steel drum, Mexican mariachi bands, Gregorian chant, Polish and German volkmusik, as well as Tchaikovsky, Mozart, and Beethoven.  I love Korean and Japanese pop (so kitschy and fun), as well as Thai classical music.  And French traditional music (les chansons de France), often with an accordian in the background, will always  evoke the essential spirit of France for me.  I love it when I have a seat in a sidewalk cafe within hearing range of a street musician with an accordian.  It just complètes the picture and creates the "magic" of Paris.

As a student in France at the peak of thé Beatles/Stones-led "British invasion" of the rock scene, I remember dismissing French attempts to develop their own version of rock music in their own language.  Such efforts were nearly always judged a woefully inadéquate "wannabe" version of the "réal" thing by those of us who smugly claimed this genre as our own, as though the English language were a prerequisite for producing a good rock song.

Nevertheless, I purchased a number of LPs, cassettes, and CDs by various French artists like Johnny Hallyday ("the French Elvis"), Serge Gainsbourg (whose Je t'aime….moi non plus was banned in the US as "too sexy"!), Claude Francois, Francoise Hardy, Mireille Mathieu, and others of that era.  Later I developed a "rétro" interest in old classics by Edith Piaf, Charles Aznavour, Charles Trenet, and Yves Montand (contemporaries of Sinatra).  Along the way, I added Michel Sardou, Patricia Kaas, and even Carla Bruni.

I love thèse singers because they bring a distinctive FRENCH vibe to popular music, yet that "vibe" has always been difficult for me to define....or at least put into words.  Obviously, understanding the French lyrics was vital to appreciating the message of the song, but it entails far more than that.    It is the "je ne sais quoi" of the mélodies, the instrumentation, the vocal styles, thé subject matter, the sentimentality.  The music itself is distinctive (to my ears) and unmistakeably French.

Michel Sardou was at the Olympia (the big "spectacle" venue in Paris) this past weekend and I purchased a ticket for his "Greatest Hits Tour".  I've followed his music for nearly four decades and his CDs chronicle my sporadic visits to France.  Even though the years are showing, he is still the quintessential French chansonnier and I thoroughly enjoyed this two hour retrospective of his music.  I may have been the only "ricaine" in the audience Sunday night since nearly everyone else clearly knew the words to all of his songs!.

Sardou wrote the song in the video below "Comme d"habitude" which is a wonderful love song..  If it sounds familiar, it's because Paul Anka later wrote the English lyrics and both he and Sinatra recorded it as "My Way," a hymn to egotism!

Just as a whiff of a familiar scent can evoke vivid memories, I can often remember in great detail a moment, a period of time, an event just by hearing a song associated with it.  Indeed, a few bars of Francoise Hardy singing "Voila" takes me straight back to 1968 and I'm twenty years old once again.