Maps of Music

Chansons Parisiennes (1949)

Where the lyrics of Chansons Parisiennes take you, and where it was really made.

This 1949 collection first reached buyers as four 78 RPM records bound into one album, and critics were split on it.

Place unknown

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1	La Vie en rose	3:11
2	C’est merveilleux	3:08
3	Monsieur Lenoble	3:29
4	Les Amants de Paris	3:11
5	Adieu mon cœur	3:07
6	Le Chant du pirate	2:11
7	Il pleut	3:22
8	Un refrain courait dans la rue	3:00

Born Édith Gassion on 19 December 1915 in Paris; died 10 October 1963 in Grasse, aged 47.
Nicknamed "La Môme Piaf" early on; stage name later shortened to Édith Piaf.
Began singing in the streets of Paris as a child with her father, a circus acrobat.
Discovered by Louis Leplée, who managed the Gerny's cabaret on the Champs-Élysées and gave her the name La Môme Piaf.
Breakthrough in the late 1930s at the ABC music hall in Paris, becoming a major star of French song.
Wrote 87 songs, including Hymne à l'amour and La Vie en rose.
Mentored Yves Montand, Les Compagnons de la chanson, Charles Aznavour and Georges Moustaki.
Sustained international success, including a Carnegie Hall triumph in 1956 and a television appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show.
Her final years were marked by serious illness and morphine dependence; she made her last Olympia appearance in 1961.

Reviews were mixed on release in January 1949
Critic Norman Johnson compared her voice to "grimy velvet", soft with a hint of nasal scratchiness
Johnson wrote that when she turned it on, her voice became as hard and clear as a policeman's whistle
Johnson concluded that Piaf made 99% of America's popular singers sound like milk-fed adolescents
Martin Roberts wrote that the set shows Piaf in many moods, from extreme happiness to extreme grief
Herbert Kennedy Jr. found a distressing uniformity in both the songs and the half-plaintive way they are sung
Kennedy granted that Piaf is highly skilled in that manner, so hearing her gives a certain pleasure
A fourth critic described her poignant style as the one that made her a toast of French and American night clubs

The collection includes "La Vie en rose"
The first release was four 78 RPM records bound together as one album
Two different orchestras backed Piaf: Chauvigny on tracks 1–3 and Luypaerts on tracks 4–8
The 1951 reissue came as a 10-inch LP with catalogue number FL 9501
The back-cover notes say Piaf picked songs that tell stories of the Paris streets and cabarets