Happy Birthday, Charles "the Singing Fool" Trenet

veradapozzo8
May 18
2 min read

To me, Charles Trenet is THE French singer and songwriter, the one who put Poetry and Popular song together and also the most beautiful French singing voice.

If my plans had worked as I had intended, I would have moved to Dublin instead of Paris, but, even if I have always had more affinity with Ireland (and the UK) and English language, I have like French language too and I have always been fascinated by the old good time when France still creates artists, poets, great singers and actors and actresses. Sadly, French music and films nowadays are quite uninteresting, and often dull, and many French people think that "Charles Trenet, c'est ringard !" - i. e., out-of-date - while he is a stunning and timeless artist who had the poetic gift both in his voice and his verses and who was extremely funny and joyful, but also really soulful and profound, in his songs as in his life.

Through the songs written by Charles Trenet, that I discovered through the Italian RAI Radio 3 when I was twelve, I naively imagined that France was a joyful place; but, when I came to Paris, I sadly realized that there was no joie de vivre at all here, and I had to admit to myself that Jean Cocteau was right when he said:

"Les Français sont des Italiens de mauvaise humeur." (Jean Cocteau)

If only I had a time machine, I would love to live in Paris from the Twenties through the Fifties of the last century.

Alas! I do not have enough time to write a proper article: the conseils de classe approach; moreover, and happily, I have also an exciting project at the Irish Cultural Centre which will require some of my very limited spare time.

Thus, for now, I will just publish few pictures of Charles Trenet, some of them with Édith Piaf (the best female French singer), Jean Cocteau (a complete artist and poet whom I adore since I was thirteen) and another great French singer, Charles Aznavour, who had the same opinion than me about Charles Trenet's importance for the chanson française.