A 707 for Carnegie Hall

In 1963, Charles Aznavour himself produced a triumphant concert at Carnegie Hall, the most prestigious venue in New York, as a prelude to an offensive on the American market. But he also brought all of Paris by special plane to witness his success.

In partnership with the exhibition It’s a song that resembles us – Worldwide hits of French-language popular music At the Cité internationale de la langue française in Villers-Cotterêts, these chronicles look in detail at each of the stories presented there.

If you are a bit of an English speaker and you know some of Charles Aznavour’s great hits, you will have understood which song he presented to the audience at Carnegie Hall, the most prestigious venue in New York, on March 30, 1963.At 18, I left my province, determined to seize life. With a light heart and a thin baggage, I was certain to conquer Paris“… This concert at Carnegie Hall is an important date for Charles Aznavour. He had started singing 20 years earlier, but success was slow in coming. And in 1963, he had only been at the top for a few years. Precisely since the success of Je me voyais already at the end of 1960.

And this unique concert in New York is as much a concert in the United States as a concert for France. Among the 2,800 spectators, there are Americans, of course, many French people from America and his guests. Nearly 150 guests of Charles Aznavour who arrived all together aboard a specially chartered Boeing 707. With Johnny Hallyday, François Sagan, François Truffaut, Michel Audiard, Guy Lux, the boss of the Olympia Bruno Coquatrix, the boss of his record company Eddie Barclay, the Minister of Industry and even two sisters of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy. And the concert is recorded by a French radio station…

In this episode of This song reminds me of usyou hear excerpts from:

Charles Aznavour, I could already see myself (in public), 1963

Charles Aznavour, You’ve Let Yourself Go (in public), 1963

Charles Aznavour, Cry Upon My Shoulder, 1958

Charles Aznavour, I Want To Be Kissed, 1958

Charles Aznavour, She, 1974

Charles Aznavour, For me formidable (in public), 1963

You can also extend this column with the book This song reminds me of us published by Heritage Publishing.

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