Revision as of 01:38, 11 August 2016

A longer list of my favourites

Classical music

1. Funeral of Queen Mary revisited by Wendy Carlos.

   No excerpt yet but see here.

2. The Deutsch Mark Is Coming, Tiersen.

As a representative of minimalism, I was initially thinking of Tiersen with a piece such as La Maison or La Démarche. I finally settled for The Deutsch Mark Is Coming (from Good Bye, Lenin!) until I finally decided to pick one from the real master of the genre, Philip Glass. More about this choice can be read in my blog.

Popular music

1. Garota de Ipanema, Jobim, Vinicius de Moraes

   (no excerpt yet but see here or here)

   This was replaced by Cálice, from Chico Buarque.

I wanted a Bossa Nova in my list, reflecting my love for the Brazilian language (not Portuguese but how it is pronounced on a continent where it found enough space to sing and resonate). There are many enchanting songs and Garota de Ipanema is surely their best representative. The song is even good when sung in English. But it's only with the Brazilian expression that it becomes alive.

The composition from Buarque does not fall in this category, but appeared to me superior in all aspects as the symbol for how Brazilian music speaks to me.

Other interesting (French) songs

Especially if you don't know them:

• Je chante, by Les têtes raides, with a Brelian touch, that is, making prominent the combination of an elaborate text that stands by itself, with an imposing vocal interpretation, with the music that links the two reduced to its simplest form.

• Je voudrais pas crever, by Serge Reggiani, singing the saddest poem of Boris Vian, "I'd hate to snuff it." Vian died 39. You never think one can actually read a poem aloud, let alone sing it. Reggiani does just that, he lets you hear a poem with a resonance that does not come from the sound of his voice.

• À quoi ça sert l'amour, a vibrant interpretation by Piaf in her old age with her young and beautiful husband, Theo Sarapo (Lamboukas), to what is and what makes love, in a touching dialogue that manages to appear more authentic than ludicrous.

• Jacobi marchait, by CharlÉlie Couture. There is a nice and smooth overlap between the artist singing and speaking.

• la complainte du phoque en Alaska, by Michel Rivard (beau dommage). It is as sad and deep as it is burlesque and ironic. It tells the story of a seal who went to pursue a career in a circus, coming to the agonizing conclusion that "it's not worth to leave one's loved ones, to spiral a ball on one's nose"~(fr).

• Foule Sentimentale, by Alain Souchon, one of the artists from my childhood whose compositions didn't grow old and retain something more than nostalgic memories.

• Marcia Baila, by Rita Mitsouko (Fred Chichin and Catherine Ringer), a highly aesthetic tribute to Marcia Moretto, a dancer and choreographer, former master of the Rita Mitsouko who honor her with a masterful display of the exercise. A beautiful line is suddenly shout at the face of everything and that, by itself, is enough to immortalize this song: "c'est la mort qui t'as assassiné Marcia"~(en).

• Quelques mots d'amour, by Michel Berger, a simplistic pop-song, along with the others to come below, but that always ring a bell with me, evoking the white nights of my teen-age where I'd be saddened by this song playing on the radio.

• Sache que je, by Jean-Jacques Goldman, an essentially commercial artist with rather forgettable compositions but with occasional departures into Art and that here strikes with a masterpiece. The whole song, nicely written, argues that important and strong things don't have to be spelled out. The overly used "Je t'aime" (I love you) is born again by its silencing: "Sache que je"~(en).

• Solitude, by Jean-Louis Aubert, a song that rings true to me, an introspection into one's loneliness, especially during childhood.