Dans Mon Ile

Today, the great French Musician, Henri Salvador died. He was 90 years old and has been a fresh influence on French and world music for the last 75 years. He was born July 18, 1917 in Cayenne, Guiana. He learned how to play the guitar by imitating Django Reinhart records and then performed with Reinhart during the 1940's.

He composed many classic songs and is credited with being a major influence on the development of Bossa Nova, but his music encompassed many styles. He actually is credited with the first French Rock Record in 1956. He recieved the Brazilian Order of Cultural Merit in 2005 from Gilberto Gil, the Brazilian Minister of Culture.

He recorded, wrote and performed until just this last December and always had a timeless youthful nature and physic that defied his years. His sense of humor was legendary and his signature was his deep ever ready laugh.
In 2002, he released the cd, Chambre avec Vue, which sold over 2,000,000 copies.. last year he released the cd, Reverence with Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso. If you haven't heard of him before and would like an overview of his music, the cd, Jazz Mediterrannee released in 2000 on Virgin Records is good place to start.

The performance of Dans Mon Ile was little more than a year ago, he wrote the song in 1957. I'd like to include another classsic, Syracuse recorded a little earlier. I couldn't find a video performance, but here is a presentation of the original recording. Merci Henri!