Articles Written By: guuzbourg

Mark is spoiling us with lots of great, newly discovered links of performances by Juliette Gréco:

A reissue of Juliette Gréco’s Mini-Recital Télévisée of 1977 has reached the internet – a 6 song special, HERE. Juliette Gréco présente : Mon Fils Chante, Fleur D’Orange, Le Mal Du Temps, L’Embellie, Donne-Moi, La Chanson Des Vieux Amants. Songs 1, 2, 3 and 5 are lip-synched; 4 and 6 are live with mike and piano accompaniment, by Gérard Jouannest , later JG’s third husband.

Especially in ‘L’Embellie’ (commences at 6m25s) there are some classic Gréco body-language and hand movements.

Enjoyable too is her performance of ‘Non, Monsieur, je n’ai pas vingt ans’ in 1980, when she was 52, introduced by a most respectful Julio Iglesias, HERE
The lyrics to this hit are HERE with a 1977 version, from German TV ZDF.
She was just as good at Strasbourg ten years later in 1987, in her 60th year, HERE.
The film is less good quality, but the performance impeccable: ‘Paris-canaille’, ‘J’arrive’

To come up to date, here is Gréco at Toulouse in January 2013 with Jouannest at the piano (fine instrumental introduction of 2 minutes to start) – aged 85. ‘Vivre’, HERE, and Leo Ferré’s ‘Avec le temps’, HERE.

An earlier treasure is this black-and-white Italian TV film made by RAI in 1966, now restored for the internet HERE.
A 6 minute medley, with parts of ‘Sous le ciel de Paris’, ‘Les feuilles mortes’ , ‘Jolie Môme’, ‘Si tu t’imagine’, and ‘Paris-canaille’.

If your band consists of two Argentians, two Japanese and two Greeks, what kind of music do you play? Exactly, bossafied French pop with technicolourful Henry Mancini-like arrangements. Magda Giannikou is the singer and architect of Banda Magda, she’s of Greek origin and apparently luuuurves French chic and Brazilian waves. Magda has a very sweet girlie voice, and writes songs with lush arrangements – Pink Martini is an obvious reference. Yet, songs like Fond de la Mer (Brazilian forro meets Pigalle) and the summerfresh Amour, ou t’es la? show that Banda Magda does have it’s own voice. The album’s out since June, listen on Bandcamp.

Banda Magda – Amour ou t’es la?

Bengale is a six-piece from Bordeaux, all biology- and computer science-students, apparently. Their Dernier Tramway EP was released via Bandcamp in 2012, but it gets an official release this month. It contains a great duet with Melissa Dubourg from Granville. (video’s coming up)
Bengale loves 80s sounds combined with lush seventies keys – no wonder they remixed Sebastien Tellier. Posted here is a quite nice remix of FS-friend Sandie Trash. More here and on Soundcloud.

Rapid-fire conga’s, screaming Hammond organ and a driving mod-beat: Ecoutez by Elsa is at least something to hear, indeed. It’s one of the top tracks on Très Chic, the sequel to the French filles-compilation Ace Records released in 2010. Again, this blog gets a mention in the credits – merci bien. If you’re a regular visitor, you might be underwhelmed by the tracklist containing Yeye-standards like Comment te dire adieu, Jazz à gogo and Tut, Tut, Tut, Tut. But there’s the wonderful, Gainsbourg-penned Au Risque de te deplaire by Marie-Blanche Vergne and the English translation of 7 Heures du Matin by Jacqueline Taieb. That, plus the excellent artwork and insightful info makes this a must-have.

Jacqueline Taieb – 7am