We are going to love each other, The Sunlights of the Tropics, Freedom,… Gilbert Montagné’s tubes are emblematic for many generations, as are his large black glasses. Blind since childhood, the 70-year-old singer confided in the show The storms of life on W9 how he lost his sight at birth. Born very premature on December 28, 1951 at only 5 and a half months, his mother had given birth on their property, “on the kitchen table“.
Placed in an incubator, the baby weighed just 950 grams. Fragile but healthy, a simple detail will unfortunately upset the infant’s life: poor oxygenation of the incubator will cause blindness. Gilbert Montagné explained: “As they didn’t know at the time [mesurer] the correct dosage to administer so that I can live, they put too much and it burned all the tissues of the optic nerve [la rétinopathie, NDLR]. But what a wonder they did, because if they hadn’t put enough in, I wouldn’t be here to tell you all about it.“
The fourth child of a very modest family, Gilbert learned very young that his parents had considered abortion before his birth, as they had very little means to raise him. Very sincere and touching, the interpreter of the title Just Because Of You confided: “Mom had thought about abortion, she had tried to find a solution. But I hung on.”