Charles Trenet part 1

Sometimes all it takes for an artist to be part of music history is just one song. Charles Trenet had that one song. He also had many other reasons to be remembered: his catalogue of songs is enormous, numbering close to a thousand. So many of those are remarkable.

The one song I'm talking about is one of the all-time classics: La Mer, or Beyond The Sea as it's known in English, which according to legend he composed with Léo Chauliac on a train in 1943, was recorded in 1946. Trenet explained in an interview that he was told that La Mer was not "swing" enough to be a hit, and for this reason it sat in a drawer for three years before being recorded. Since then it boasts more than 400 recorded versions, with over 70 million copies sold in total. Here's Trenet's original version:

That wasn't the first recorded version, however. The honor belongs to Roland Gerbeau, a close friend (or whatever) of Trenet, who recorded it, with Trenet's help, in 1945:

Here's a beautiful live version sung live by Trenet some years later:

Here's gay icon Dalida with her own version in 1978:

The English-language version, Beyond The Sea, was a minor US hit for Benny Goodman in 1948 and then a #37 US hit for Roger Williams in 1955:

It was Bobby Darin, however, who had the most successful English-language version, in 1956. It peaked at #6 in the US Hot 100, at #15 in the US R&B chart and at #8 in the UK.

George Benson recorded an R&B version of the song under the title Beyond The Sea (La Mer). This version peaked at #60 in the UK.

Robbie Williams released a version of the song on his album Swing When You're Winning in 2001, which was used in the ending credits for the 2003 Disney Pixar film Finding Nemo.

Charles Trenet, who died aged 87 in 2001, was the most influential popular French songwriter of the mid-20th century. A performer of immense charm, with a light baritone voice of individual, caressing softness, he created - with his near-contemporaries Jean Sablon and Yves Montand - a style veering between wistful nostalgia and exuberant bravado that withstood the hegemony of American Pop music for more than 30 years.

Born Louis Charles Auguste Claude Trenet at Narbonne, Occitanie, France on 18 May 1913, he was sent to boarding school in Béziers, after his parents divorced when he was seven, but he returned home just a few months later, suffering from typhoid fever.

It was during his convalescence at home that he developed his artistic talents, taking up music, painting and sculpting. In 1922, Trenet moved to Perpignan, this time as a day pupil. A water-colourist friend of the family André Fons-Godail, the "Catalan Renoir", used to take him out painting. His poetry is said to have the painter's eye for detail and colour. Many of his songs had references to his surroundings such as places near Narbonne, the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean coast.

He passed his baccalauréat with high marks in 1927. After leaving school he left for Berlin (the gay capital at the time) where he studied art, and later he also briefly studied art in France, at the Académie des Arts Décoratives. When Trenet first arrived in Paris in the 1930s, he worked in a movie studio as a props handler and assistant, and later joined up with the artists in the Montparnasse neighbourhood. His admiration of the surrealist poet and Catholic mystic Max Jacob (1876–1944) and his love of jazz were two factors that influenced Trenet's songs.

He was just 19 when his songs were first recorded. From 1932, here's his song Hélène, sung by Hélène Regelly:

At a student haunt, College Inn, in the rue Vavin in Montparnasse, the 20-year-old Trenet met the pianist Johnny Hess. Two years younger than Trenet, Hess came from Switzerland and had studied with Horowitz, but soon turned towards jazz, influenced by the music of Arthur Briggs and Django Reinhardt. The two became co-authors of a series of songs which they performed in cabaret as Charles et Johnny; at first, Trenet wrote the words and Hess the music, but later in his career, Trenet was sole author of all his material.

Here are Charles et Johnny with their late 1933 - early 1934 hit Rengaine D'Amour:

Later in 1934 they had a hit with Le Duel:

Although Charles et Johnny included some numbers by Cole Porter and Stéphane Grappelli in their repertoire, most of their duets were their own work - witty, cheeky songs that soon caught on, including Maman, Ne Vends Pas La Maison, Sous Le Lit De Lily, and one of Trenet's earliest solo successes, Rendezvous Sous La Pluie, which was also recorded and made a hit by Jean Sablon in 1935, who was already a big star of music and film.

The duo continued until 1936 when Trenet was called up for national service. It was after his national service that Trenet received the nickname that he would retain all his life: "Le Fou chantant" (The Singing Madman). In 1937, Trenet began his solo career, adopting the outfit he wore on stage for the next 50 years or more - light blue, double-breasted suit, dark shirt and pale tie, a narrow-brimmed Fedora perched on the back of his head. Another gay multi-talented (famous novelist, poet, playwright, painter and film-maker) man, Jean Cocteau, drew a famous poster showing Trenet in this outfit, but equipped with angels' wings, floating in mid-air.

His first solo disc was Je Chante / Fleur Bleue. The exuberant Je Chante gave rise to the notion of Trenet as a "singing vagabond", a theme that appeared in a number of his early songs and films. Here's Je Chante:

Trenet's facility with words and music soon brought commissions from established stage and recording artists. He wrote Y'a De La Joie for Maurice Chevalier, and Vous Qui Passez Sans Me Voir once more for Jean Sablon, while the as-yet-unkown Yves Montand made his debut in 1937 with Trenet's C'est La Vie Qui Va. Here's Maurice Chevalier with Y'a De La Joie:

... And here's Trenet himself singing C'est La Vie Qui Va in the film "Je chante" in 1938:

A big hit for Trenet, also in 1938, was Boum:

Il Pleut Dans Ma Chambre, a song which first appeared in the film "La route enchantée" in 1938, became a hit in 1939:

... Which leads us to the 40s and 50s, possibly the most important 20 years in Trenet's career: World War II was under way, the Nazi occupation of France happened, with a certain controversy concerning Trenet, his biggest and most enduring hits were recorded, and the gay scandal which led to his inprisonment occurred. That's a lot of juicy stuff, which will be covered tomorrow. See you then!