I would like to add two more songs to my list of favourite French songs.
The first one is the haunting theme from the highly emotional movie, 'Un homme et une femme (A man and a woman). The composer was Francis Lai who gained international fame after this 1966 film score and won the Golden Globe award for it. He would go on to sweep all possible awards in 1970 for the musical score of the even more emotional movie, 'Love Story'.
The second song is 'Les feuilles mortes' (Dead leaves).This was composed for a 1946 French movie 'Les portes de la nuit' (Gates of the night) and sung by Irene Joachim. Johnny Mercer gave it English lyrics and it was first sung by Jo Stafford in 1950 as 'Autumn leaves'. It became a top hit and soon all famous English singers were recording it including Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra and Doris Day. Of course, all of us love the unforgettable Nat King Cole version of it.
Not that well-known, but the pianist Roger Williams' instrumental recording of it was the no.1 bestseller in 1955.
What an amazing movie (and music) that was - Love Srory!
ReplyDeleteSeems like there are a few of our favorite English songs that have French origins. I’ll add one to the ones you’ve mentioned. ‘My Way’ (1969) was set to the music of ‘Comme d’habitude’ (As Usual - 1967), composed and written by Claude François and Jacques Revaux. Paul Anka flew to Paris to negotiate the rights to the song, after he heard the original performed by Claude François, on a holiday in the South of France. Paul then wrote the English lyrics – which are not related to the French - for Frank Sinatra, but sang and recorded it himself as well, including in Spanish with Julio Iglesias. (Wikipedia)
ReplyDeleteThanks Sharad. That was really illuminating. Didn’t know the origin of ‘My way’ which one presumes to be Frank Sinatra’s exclusive!
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