Showing posts with label Piaf. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Piaf. Show all posts

Monday, May 7, 2012

Eve Loiseau as Piaf

with Fiona Barrow on violin and Edward Jay on piano accordion. Arrangements by Edward Jay.

At Uppingham Theatre on Friday May 4th.

Well worth watching - she sang the songs with duende, and had the necessary stage presence. A lovely evening.

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Oh la la - Parisian music evening

At Gretton Village Hall, courtesy of Northants Touring Arts.
A selection of French and English songs - Piaf, Henri Salvador and others, plus some jazz. Instrumentalists - violin, guitar and double bass were excellent. Singer a bit too gimmicky, and not close enough to the originals for my taste, especially in Les Amants d'un Jour , La Vie en Rose.   Would have been good if she'd included Milord.

However, pleasant and entertaining evening, and very close at hand. CD is good.

A previous event of Estonian music was more exciting and involving - Ro:ToRo

Thursday, February 14, 2008

La Vie en Rose

Absorbing story of Edith Piaf's life. Superb visually -reminded me of various painters A lot of the inside scenes had the dark colours and lighting effects of Degas, Cezanne, Van Gogh , even the poster colours of Toulouse Lautrec. I'm thinking of the scene where Titine and the child Edith are wearing clown-style lipstick. A few beach scenes rather like Monet's Normandy paintings.

Edith herself had a wretched background. She was abandoned by her mother, dumped on her grandmother who ran a brothel, torn away from there by her father who was a circus acrobat and contortionist. She started her career as a singer on the Paris streets. She had a daughter who died of meningitis. As she became famous and successful, she continued to abuse alcohol and drugs. The love of her life, boxer Marcel Cerdan, died in a plane crash. In the end she seemed totally trapped by her role as the suffering star.

Marion Cotillard acted the part superbly, bringing out the pathos and the self-centred arrogance.
I did start to lose concentration during the long deathbed scene with flashbacks, but it's a film I could easily watch again.