songs and tons of memories

They remind us of stories of love, childhood or solitude. They are the songs. From Christophe to Biolay, from Barbara to Manset, their melodies and words resonate and memories arise. No more controversy, the song would therefore indeed be a major Art.

On the stage of the Comédie Française Studio, until May 5, Major Art, for an hour and a few following evenings, immerses us in the repertoire of French song. After The ballad of Souchon directed by Françoise Gillard and the evocation of Gainsbourg with The Serges by Stéphane Varupenne and Sébastien Pouderoux, the troupe continues with these cabarets to break new ground in this musical and popular repertoire.

The show begins with this historic face-to-face meeting of Serge Gainsbourg and Guy Béart in the show Apostrophes of December 26, 1986. Gainsbourg emphasizes his affectionate disdain for the song: “it’s a minor art! The major arts are architecture, literature, classical music, painting…”.

Béart will not have the last word in front of the judge of elegance. But the most poetic of song writers, Gainsbarre, will be contradicted almost 40 years later by the Comédie-Française, French song, word and music is indeed a major art.

Brel, Barbara, Christophe, Manset, Higelin, Hardy, Bashung or Rita, among others, there will be 20 whose songs, hits or B side of 45 rpm records will remind the public of a moment in their lives. The point is simple for Guillaume Barbot, the director: “Can a song change the course of our lives?”

A playlist of memories

Guillaume Barbot summarizes his intention in the program as follows: “Music for an hour, a 60-minute album, with musical tracks, sung, spoken, and each time the swing of words, voices and recordings.” And one and the same question for each character: “What place does song hold in your lives?”. The director commissioned four texts around this question and so each character responds by telling us about their life lulled by melodies.

For the actress Véronique Vella, it will be Barbara à Bobino and her mother who dresses her as if for a big outing. We are in 1961, she is five years old and they leave for what is still a cabaret. The child does not understand everything about this great lady, this black flamingo. She falls asleep on the red velvet of the armchair and when she wakes up, Barbara sings Rock, this love song where the word is never spoken, and she sees “the rimmel running down mom’s cheek”.

Thus can arise a fascination for the one who was presented as “a living poem by Prevert“. And Bobino’s little girl will never forget these words: “It’s rainingur languid gardens. On the roses of the night. He raining tears of rain.” Then the sound of a downpour or a storm on a veranda will resonate like a melody.

20 years later, the child has grown up, the woman loved madly, was also dumped by her man, and she finds Barbara, alone. For those who have experienced the Pantin concerts, when Véronique Vella recounts the 20, 25, 30 minutes of frenzied applause at the end of the concert, the spectator hears the beating hearts of Barbara’s admirers.

“A song is so stupid and yet”

For Thierry Hancisse, whose playing, silhouette and voice recall the Belgian singer Arno or Hubert-Félix Thiéfaine, this will be the sentence: “a song is so stupid and yet”, it brings a tear to any rocker with a heart of stone. Without scruple, he unrolls Higelin’s song. “I can’t say I love you anymore” and confess this thought: “the kind of sadness that makes our eyes overflow our remaining joys.” Probably an abandoned guy.

So goes the playlist telling parts of our lives. For Léa Lopez, as a child, she who waddles in front of the mirror, dreaming of being a singer on Télephone or Trust, will be a punk when she grows up. Or classical dancer. And in the end, it’s melancholy that wins as always, around the piano, the troupe is gathered like friends first on a Nino Ferrer: The south… Time lasts a long time, and life surely, more than a million years and always in summer.

The Comédie-Française therefore regularly takes up this popular art that is songs. A French specificity, this variety which from generation to generation, from the car radio on the road to vacation to karaoke evenings to the songs exchanged between lovers, creates the collective imagination. On stage, they invent a recital that resembles a jukebox of memories and images. Ready to hand over a coin to listen to some good old rock and roll again in their company.

MAJOR ART
By Pauline Delabroy-Allard,
Emmanuelle Fournier-Lorentz, Simon Johannin
And Gilles Leroy
Staging
Guillaume Barbot
From March 21 to May 5, 2024
Duration 1h20 at the Comédie Française Studio