It was in 2003. The year of the reform of the civil servants pension system and the deadly heat wave.
Juliette Gréco did not adapt well to old age.
"A very uncomfortable piece of furniture
,
"
she confided before leaving with a huge childish laugh.
Read also: Juliette Gréco, the death of a rebel
At the time, she had made a decision.
Return to her favorite role, the one for which she claimed a certain talent, the only one, that of interpreter.
There it became a muse for what was called the new French song.
Biolay, Miossec, Bénabar ... They had all taken out their finest pen to write texts for him.
"It was necessary to be at the height of all these enormous authors that she had in the past"
, recognizes today on RTL the singer from Brest.
“I have always included young authors in my repertoire. We still have to find the talent. However, Benjamin Biolay has a lot of it. He is capable of doing anything. It makes me very happy because in 1954 I met Brel. He was very young and so was I. A little later, Gainsbourg. Aznavour, Ferré, Béart, all were beginners. I am told that I have an exceptional repertoire. But wake up, drelin, drelin, at the age of Biolay, they were nobody! I was a little better known for other reasons. I was an object, a mythical genre
, ”she confessed to us
.
Before adding, very lucid:
“I am demanding on the quality of the texts because I was spoiled rotten from the start.
Benjamin Biolay symbolizes this improvement.
On condition that he leaves Gainsbourg's cigarette in the ashtray ... "
To read also: "She broke all the codes": the heartbreaking tributes to Juliette Gréco
Shortly after our meeting in her Parisian fiefdom, at the Hotel Lutetia, where she had found her mother and older sister one fine day in 1945, returning from their deportation, in Ravensbrück, Juliette Gréco authorized me to attend the recording of this album entitled "Love each other, or else disappear".
She had imposed this title on her record company.
At Studio Ferber, in the north-east of Paris, Miossec was there.
Biolay too.
She found them beautiful.
"And beauty, that rests me"
, she amused herself.
Mano Solo arrived next, looking defeated.
He had just learned that his text was unfortunately not retained on the record of the Greco.
The singer then decides to take him aside.
Sheltered from prying ears, she whispers a few words to him.
His long bony hand caresses the hollow cheek of Cabu's son.
And there, Mano Solo bursts into tears, a tall, skinny boy shaking with spasms.
He then flees the Studio, understanding that his name would not be associated with the diva of Saint-Germain-des-Près.
“She did not take the song as a joke or a hobby, especially not
, remembers Miossec.
She's one of those people who makes you take the song seriously.
And with her, the song was art, something that flew very high.
Each adjective could have a crazy importance.
The slightest breath, the slightest comma was worked on. "
In these tears of Mano Solo, this infinite sadness, we could see how an exceptional repertoire had been born.
At the cost of what sacrifices, what demands, he had built himself.
There, in this heartbreaking scene, all of Juliette Gréco, her authority and her tenderness ...