It’s a song that resembles us. “Parlez-moi d’amour”, the first French worldwide hit

“Parlez-moi d’amour”, a song by Jean Lenoir recorded in 1930 by Lucienne Boyer, spread throughout the world in its original version, also giving rise to numerous covers in French by foreign artists.

In partnership with the exhibition It’s a song that resembles us – Worldwide hits of French-speaking 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.

This song traveled all over the world – well, everywhere where there were phonographs to listen to Lucienne Boyer’s Columbia 78 rpm record. And since Columbia was present in the United States, Great Britain, Australia, Germany, Italy… Tell me about love became a hit record almost everywhere in the world – it was even the first major international hit by a French artist in 1930.

So much so that it has become rooted in the collective memory of many countries. It is true that one does not need to speak French fluently to understand the lyrics. Here is Ramona Wulf in Germany in 1978 and Gigliola Cinqueti in Italy in 1974.

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

Lucienne Boyer, Tell me about love, 1930

Ramona Wulf, Tell me about love, 1978

Gigliola Cinquetti, Tell me about love, 1974

Greta Keller, Tell me about love, 1932

Carlos Gardel, Tell me about love, 1933

Gilles and Julien, Don’t talk about love, 1932

Lucienne Boyer, Tell me about something else, 1933

Anne Sofie von Otter, Tell me about love, 2013

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

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