Soprano, singer, rapper and composer, has become in a few years a staple of the urban scene and French variety. The symbol that everything is possible if you keep passion and desire as the only engines.
He is spending this week on franceinfo and talks about his childhood in the northern districts of Marseille, his group Psy 4 de la rime, his meeting with Akhenaton from IAM or his solo career without ever losing his smile and his benevolent gaze on the world around him.
More than 3 million records sold, more than a million spectators during his last tour. A series has even been dedicated to him on Disney + since June 15. Six episodes to better understand who Soprano is, how he grew up and perceive his unfailing link with the city of Marseille, which played a major role in his creative and writing process.
His last album, star huntercame out increased by three new titles.
franceinfo: At the start, there was this desire to do battle with life, the desire to build a better and positive future with your friends and the Psy 4 de la rime. In 2008, during the classical music ceremony, you won the prize for the best album for Since you have to live and Has a well also allows you to receive that of the best song. How did you experience being dubbed by such an important ceremony and which is ultimately far from your music?
Soprano: The reward that touched me the most was an afro reward. I had sung Since you have to live. I saw people in the room crying. It moved me a lot, a lot because basically, this album, I had done it to cure my demons.
“I had written ‘Since it is necessary to live’ to be able to turn a page and leave a little more in the positive, to try to build my life because really, I was not in a good ‘mood’.”
When I see the impact that this album has had on many generations, it touched me very, very much.
In 2010, your album, The Dove, ranks among the best-selling albums in France. It also becomes a gold record. Your career is launched, but above all, you have already been propelled very far, very high. How did you experience this ascent?
I experienced it with my friends. We took a lot of step back and in addition, between this album and the previous album, I had released an album with my group. Suddenly, it protected me from putting myself behind my friends because when you promote, when you experience something, a success like that, you take it in the face, all alone. And when you return with your group, you share this magnificent weight.
How was it in the neighborhood?
It made me laugh. People in the neighborhood who, for example, didn’t talk to me much or maybe I only knew from afar said every time: “He was at school with me! Him, I know him!“When we were on TV, we received messages from people in the neighborhood:”We have tears in our eyes. We would never have believed. You talk about our neighborhood“. It was a lot, a lot of pride and still today, there is a lot of pride in my neighborhood.
Three singles come out of this album: Crazy, Sand castle and Hiro with Indila, music by Skalp. You are referring to the temporal power of the fictional character Hiro Nakamura from the series heroes who can time travel and who does everything to prevent bad things. He tries to live or relive very important moments for him. What did you want to experience or relive at that time?
The message of this song is the desire to travel through time, to change moments in history or in our lives, or even relive magnificent moments. From the first sentence, I say: I would have liked to relive the birth of my children because it was extraordinary. But the most important thing is to enjoy the present moment. Because we don’t know what’s going to happen. Better say you love people now before it’s too late.
Did you take the time to take advantage of what was happening to you? It’s a bit of a chase. There are these victories, this love of the public, but also the fact of saying to oneself: I have to last, I have to last, I have to stay.
I work a lot and above all I love music. I try to evolve and I think changing my style all the time is what has kept me going. Renewing yourself means putting yourself back in danger, so starting a new adventure, re-appreciating a new character, a new route and I find that it’s not the arrival, but the journey that is the most important.
This title, Hiro, is part of what defines you. That’s how you always move forward. What does this song represent in your repertoire?
It’s my favorite song. That I like to do on stage, that I manage to listen to again, there is everything that is a bit me.
“In ‘Hiro’, I talk about my family, I talk about my ideas, I talk about my regrets, I talk about what revolts me in the world, what I would have liked to relive because those were moments magical.”
When I talk about Michael Jackson’s moonwalk, I would have liked to be there, to experience it. But how I would have liked to change certain moments in history. The best moment is when I sang it in Togo. I was on stage, I start to sing and I see soldiers with weapons, moms and there is a sentence where I say: “I would have been on the bus, in Angola, of the Adebayor team to tell them not to take the road“At the time, I’m not careful. It was the story of a team, the Togo team, which during the CAN had taken a path where there were guys who arrived armed, who fired. And just at that precise moment, when I do that, everyone shouts: “The soldiers nearby, they shoot“.
Someone comes on stage with the flag around me. The shivers went up to me, the people who cry arrived at this sentence and the person who put the flag to me speaks in my ear and says to me: “I was on that bus“. This song made me live extraordinary moments.
Soprano will be in concert in 2023: 13 February 2023 in Epernay, 24 in Toulon, 25 in Montpellier, 4 March in Amnéville, 11 and 12 in Nantes, 17 in Châteauroux, 18 and 19 in Dijon or even May 6 at the Stade de France in Saint-Denis.