French singer and actress Edith Piaf, whose interpretation of the chanson (French ballad) made her internationally famous, was born.
Piaf's music was often autobiographical and she specialized in chanson and torch ballads about love, loss and sorrow.
The tradition of the French chanson, the romantic French ballad, has continued, however, following such legendary stylists as Juliette Gréco, Edith Piaf, Belgian-born Jacques Brel, Charles Aznavour, and Georges Brassens.
There are hints of chansons and cabaret ballads, but Keren Ann's songs also share the steely understatement of Suzanne Vega.
Different scholars have slightly different counts; where Holier and Block count three ballads and three chanson de toiles, Maureen Barry McCann Boulton counts six chansons de toile; in her detailed investigation of the chansons she claims the poem contains forty-six chansons in eight different genres.
Using crackly transfers from his own collection, Smith pulled together every kind of ballad, work song, parlor tune, and Cajun chanson.
The music slaloms between genres – hard rock, big ballads with a hint of the declamatory vocals of chanson about them, unreconstructed 50s rock'n'roll, 70s stuff decorated with proggy keyboard arpeggios – which tells you something about the sheer length of his career.
Mr. N'Dour has now remedied the obligatory French ballad that has often been the downfall of his albums; this time, the chanson accordion is levitated by Senegalese percussion.
He belonged to the grand line of French ballad writers and is survived by his wife, three children and thousands of chansons.
