Hair tied with a braid, orange glasses, dressed in "sportswear", Sylvie Vartan receives us in her Parisian confinement to reveal an exceptional anniversary year.
For her 60-year career, she will record a 50th album which will be released in the fall, and will coincide with her return on stage, in October, in Paris and then on tour.
"This is the fourth time that I put the show again, I hope it will be the right one", she admits, before confiding to us that she would like to be vaccinated.
In May, his record company Sony will reissue its vinyl and streaming records, and the XO editions will release a biography by Christian and Eric Cazalot.
“I'm curious to read their look on me,” she admits.
There is even a documentary in the works.
I also take advantage of the confinement to watch my videos on YouTube, I discover a lot.
"
You live between Los Angeles and Paris.
Did you come home a long time ago?
SYLVIE VARTAN.
I came back in September hoping to sing in October.
And that was canceled.
Since then, I have been sealed off at home.
But I am confined by nature… And I swim in happiness because I prepare a lot of things, starting with a new album, which I will record in a month.
The first with new songs in eight years.
It will be my fiftieth!
It's incredible !
Want to beat Johnny's record, which made it 51?
(Smiles)
Oh, I'm not trying to break a record, or race.
In fact, I have never thought about a career.
Basically, I always wanted to be an artist, to keep a youthful soul, I have always dreamed of blue light on stage, theater and musical comedy.
As a child, in Bulgaria, shows changed my life.
And as time goes by, I realize how lucky I am, how privileged I have to always do what I want and to have a loyal following.
The longevity that every artist dreams of ...
My God, those 60 years have passed like a whirlwind.
And it continues.
I am always in a hurry.
I tell myself that I need to calm down, but I never do things in a relaxed, lukewarm way, I'm always on the go.
I sing so as not to let myself be overcome by melancholy.
Singing, it calms, it makes you forget the daily life, the difficulties, the sorrow ... It avoids having a therapist.
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How did your career start?
In the living room of a private mansion on rue Baujon, in Paris, in 1961. I cannot forget this first recording because it is so incredible.
It wasn't even in a studio, there was just a microphone and a sound engineer.
And I was in high school.
The song was called "Out of Gas".
It was a duet with Frankie Jordan.
My big brother Eddy had asked me to skip my math class to record instead of Gillian Hills
(Editor's note: singer from the 1960s)
, who was taken by a shoot.
It lasted an hour or two.
The record came out, I wasn't paying attention.
And it was such madness that I had to quit school, I didn't even pass the bac.
It wasn't a snowball, it was an avalanche.
And the whirlwind has begun!
Sixty years later, how will your 50th album be?
It will be contrasted, but not overproduced.
I am delighted with the songs written by new authors, Clarika and Jean-Jacques Nyssen, Rose, Joseph d'Anvers, la Grande Sophie, who had already written me a song on the album "Soleil bleu"… The themes are mine. close, as always, love, family, exile, but written in a very original, very modern way.
I have 18 songs at my disposal, I've never had so many!
Will there be a duet with your son David?
Oh no, not at this time.
He is in his music, has just released his album… And me, I am especially his mother, before being an artist.
I like to sing with him, but I am very emotional and I admit that each time I am very moved, as on the cover of “Will you be there”
(Editor's note: by Michel Berger)
that I had had hard to sing on TV.
I saw David recently, but we are all scattered around the world.
In this family, we are all nomads, Rolling Stones, it's not easy to get together.
And what will “the recital” be like?
Intimate.
It has been a long time since I wanted to be in a theater, the place of my first passion, and I see myself well in Edouard-VII.
I will be surrounded by few musicians.
On the piano, it will be my faithful friend Gérard Daguerre, with whom I have toured around the world.
We will take again "My childhood", by Barbara
(Editor's note: for which Daguerre was also the favorite pianist)
, a song that I have the impression of having written so much it looks like me.
Will you take Johnny again?
No, I did enough on my last album and my last concert.
And I already have such a hard time choosing among my songs.
I have maybe a thousand.
Between those I haven't performed for a long time and the essentials, I want to sing three hours.
In a book entitled "Lady Lucille", journalist Gilles Lhote spoke last year of a secret passion between Johnny and Catherine Deneuve.
What do you think ?
(Bursts out laughing)
That's what inspires me.
What this gentleman is saying is very false.
That Johnny had a "crush" (Editor's note: a crush) for Catherine and vice versa, when they were filming "Les Parisiennes", there is nothing improbable.
They were beautiful, they were young.
Afterwards, the three of us were friends.
We had a lot of them in the business.
But hey, Johnny is the delight of the echotiers and sells paper, it has always been like that.
Have you listened to his posthumous albums?
Always not.
They are for me the symbol of his illness, of his distress.
It is not him in his energy, his brilliance, his magnificence.
That's why I wanted to sing it in its sun.
I don't want it to be damaged.
In concert on October 11 and 12 at the Edouard-VII theater, in Paris (IXth), then on tour in France, Switzerland and Belgium.