''Les Chansons d'Aragon'' (English: "''Songs of Aragon''") is an album by

Léo Ferré Léo Ferré (24 August 1916 – 14 July 1993) was a French-born Monégasque poet and composer, and a dynamic and controversial live performer, whose career in France dominated the years after the Second World War until his death. He released s ...

, released in 1961 by

Barclay Records Barclay is a French record company and label founded by Eddie Barclay in 1953. Eddie Barclay was a bandleader, pianist, producer, and nightclub owner. With his wife, Nicole, who was the vocalist in his band, he started Barclay. The catalogue inc ...

. It is his second album dedicated to a

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

, after

Baudelaire Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist and art critic. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticism inherited fro ...

's '' Les Fleurs du mal'' in 1957. Here, Ferré focuses on former surrealist

Louis Aragon Louis Aragon (, , 3 October 1897 – 24 December 1982) was a French poet who was one of the leading voices of the surrealist movement in France. He co-founded with André Breton and Philippe Soupault the surrealist review ''Littérature''. He wa ...

, but the body of work he chooses (poetry collection '' Le Roman inachevé'', mostly) is not surrealistic. This album had much more impact than Ferré's first Baudelaire effort, maybe because when it was published Ferré was gaining both success and critical acclaim on stage, and Aragon was an active poet and a controversial committed

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

figure in the French intellectual field.

History

Léo Ferré began to set

's poems to music in the fall of 1958Alain Raemackers, album ''La Mauvaise Graine'' booklet, La Mémoire et la Mer, 2006. and completed the task in March 1959. At that time, Ferré was not under contract to a record label. After several refusals, Ferré ended up signing with Eddie Barclay in 1960. Barclay was sceptical about sung poetry and asked him to release an album of catchier middle-of-the-road tunes before he would release the Aragon record. Ferré obliged by recording the album ''

Paname Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Sin ...

,'' which included classics such as "Paname" and "Jolie môme". ''Les Chansons d'Aragon'' was finally recorded in January 1961 and released in February 1961. The finished album lists only 10 of the original 12 compositions. Ferré changed most of the original titles, and sometimes eliminated some verses or changed their order. Aragon, who was greatly impressed by Ferré’s adaptations, wrote a liner text wherein he recognized Ferré as a true poet and claimed that "the literary history of France

ould Ould is an English surname and an Arabic name ( ar, ولد). In some Arabic dialects, particularly Hassaniya Arabic, ولد‎ (the patronymic, meaning "son of") is transliterated as Ould. Most Mauritanians have patronymic surnames. Notable p ...

have to be re-written a little differently because of the contribution made by Léo Ferré". This album is a landmark and is considered as an evergreen classic of the French song repertoire.

Track listing

Texts by Louis Aragon. Music composed by Léo Ferré.

Personnel

Barthélémy Rosso Barthélémy Rosso, a/k/a Mimi Rosso (b. Monaco, d. 1971), was a French guitarist and arranger of jazz and classical music. Although he played occasionally with Sidney Bechet,En 1957 au Théâtre de l'Étoile photographies/ref> he is best known ...

– guitar (uncredited) * Jean Cardon – accordion (uncredited) * The session musicians hired for the recording

Credits

* Arranger & band conductor:

Jean-Michel Defaye Jean-Michel Defaye (born 18 September 1932) is a French pianist, composer, arranger and conductor known for his collaboration with French poet and singer-songwriter Léo Ferré. He was born in Saint-Mandé, Val-de-Marne near Paris, on 18 Septemb ...

* Director of engineering: Gerhard Lehner (uncredited) * Executive producer: Jean Fernandez (uncredited) * Cover photography: André Gornet

External links

Album presentation
(French)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chansons d'Aragon Léo Ferré albums French-language albums Barclay (record label) albums 1961 albums Works by Louis Aragon