He had participated in the creation of songs as well known as “La Java des bombes atomics”, “Le Métèque” or “Le Poinçonneur des Lilas” and worked with many singers, from Boris Vian to Abd al Malik. Alain Goraguer died at 91.
A man in the shadows, the composer and jazz pianist Alain Goraguer, who was the musical arranger of many greats of French song, such as Serge Gainsbourg or Jean Ferrat, died Monday evening February 13 in Paris at the age of 91, a announced his wife to AFP.
“My job, he explained to World in January 2019, consists of rectifying a melody written with clumsiness so that it is elegant. It can be a harmonic passage, a change of tone …”. Curious about all kinds of music, with a prediction for jazz, he has left his mark on songs as famous as The mountain by Jean Ferrat The Metec by Georges Moustaki or Wax doll, sound doll, interpreted by France Gall and grand prize of Eurovision 65.
From Boris Vian to Brigitte Fontaine
First accompanying the singer Simone Alma, he met Boris Vian with whom he wrote I drink, Atomic Bomb Java, Hurt Me, Johnnythen composes the soundtrack of the film I’ll go spit on your graves (1959). At the end of the 1950s, he began a collaboration with a beginner named Serge Gainsbourg for whom he created jazz and exotic arrangements until 1964 (The Lilac Puncher, Intoxicated Man, etc). With Gainsbourg, he signs several film scores.
In 1960, another long collaboration was born with Boby Lapointe (Aragon and Castile, The Mother of Fishes, etc). Alain Goraguer then worked for Brigitte Bardot, Salvatore Adamo, Brigitte Fontaine, Juliette Gréco, Joe Dassin, Nana Mouskouri or Régine.
A long collaboration with Jean Ferrat
But most of his work as arranger and orchestrator will be done with Jean Ferrat, with whom he colors, reharmonises, enriches titles as emblematic as Potemkin, My France, Tell me about the sea Or Women are men’s future.
Alain Goraguer, author of the music for dozens of pornographic films in the 1970s and 1980s (often under a pseudonym), had finally signed the credits of Véronique and Davina’s hit TV show, Gym tonic (1982) and collaborated on the album Dante (2008) by rapper Abd al Malik.