French Pop History

"  Any rock and roll fan worth his or her salt has heard of Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. American songwriters and producers supreme, repsonsible for the biggest and best hits of the Drifters and the Coasters, creators of the soundtrack for Elvis Presley's Jailhouse Rock  and so much more...  The list of artists who have recorded their work is a very, very long one, but few fans would expect to find the name of Édith Piaf in the list. Yet there she is...and therein lies a story. In the early fifties, la môme Piaf  had established herself not only as the leading French music hall performer of the era but also as the international embodiment of French chanson , with a repertoire full of future standards such as "La vie en rose" (1948), "Hymne à l'amour" (1950), "Padam... padam" (1951) and "Bravo pour le clown" (1953). She was however spending increasing amounts of time abroad, principally in the United States, where she toured regular...

  As many music fans of a certain age will know, Johnny Hallyday was the once and future king of rock 'n' roll in France, shooting to stardom in 1960 and staying the course right through to his death in 2017. This extraordinary longevity is often thought to have come at the cost of international success, with many believing that Hallyday deliberately turned his back on an international career in order to remain king at home, but that wasn't quite how it really was... Two years into his career and with his bilingual, million-selling cover of Chubby Checker's "Let's Twist Again" ("Viens danser le twist") still on the French airwaves, Hallyday flew to Nashville in February 1962 to record his first American album with producer Shelby Singleton. The latter arraned for a crack session crew to back the singer, among them pianist Floyd Cramer, saxophonists Boots Randolph and Bill Justis, bassist Bob Moore, drummer Buddy Harman, and guitarists Jerry Kenne...