For nearly seventy-five years the French cabaret performer and composer Charles Aznavour remained a central presence in modern chanson. Early in the 1950s he frequently served as opening act for Edith Piaf while also supplying her with several original songs, thereby establishing a lasting reputation for both inventive songwriting and distinctive vocal delivery. His particular gift lay in crafting material from unexpected perspectives, yielding intimate, empathetic portraits that broadened the emotional scope of the conventional pop ballad. He appeared in dozens of motion pictures, most notably François Truffaut’s Shoot the Piano Player, and continued to record and tour until shortly before his passing in 2018.
That he became the embodiment of French popular culture carried a certain irony for someone who felt most strongly tied to his Armenian background. Originally named Shahnour Varenagh Aznavourian, he acquired French connections when his family escaped the threat of Turkish violence; his father worked as a singer and occasional restaurateur, while his mother pursued acting and occasional sewing. The impassioned manner in which his father sang left a deep mark on Aznavour’s own youthful approach to performance. Although intensely drawn to music, he also contended with a paralyzed vocal cord that produced a naturally raspy tone. He directed part of his youthful energy toward the stage, making his theatrical and cinematic debuts at age nine in 1933 with the play Un Bon Petite Diable and the film La Guerre des Gosses. As a teenager he danced in nightclubs, hawked newspapers, joined touring theatrical troupes, and co-wrote a nightclub revue with Pierre Roche, supplying the lyrics that launched his own singing career. He gradually overcame self-doubt about his vocal limitations, aided in part by Edith Piaf, for whom he drove and performed assorted tasks; under her guidance he shaped a style suited to his voice and persisted in writing songs, several of which Piaf later performed.
Recognition arrived only gradually. At first Aznavour encountered resistance as a composer both in France and abroad. Though mild by later standards, his songs were judged too risqué for French radio and remained barred from broadcast for roughly a decade spanning the late 1940s into the end of the 1950s; American publishers displayed comparable reluctance when he visited New York in 1948. That same trip nevertheless produced his initial engagement in the city, at Cafe Society Downtown in Greenwich Village. Throughout the following ten years he earned his living in modest clubs and lower slots on bills across three continents. Audiences initially reacted with uncertainty to his candid, unconventional love songs and restrained yet highly expressive vocal manner.
A decisive turn occurred in 1956 during a vaudeville booking in Casablanca that prompted an enthusiastic response and elevated him to headliner status. Thereafter he secured stronger engagements in France and obtained a recording contract by 1958. That year also marked his first dramatic screen appearance, portraying an epileptic in Georges Franju’s La Tête Contre les Murs. He likewise composed the score for Alex Joffé’s Du Rififi Chez les Femmes. Subsequent roles in more prominent films followed, among them Jean Cocteau’s Testament of Orpheus and François Truffaut’s Shoot the Piano Player; the latter transformed Aznavour into a French screen favorite and paved the way for his American breakthrough. He performed at Carnegie Hall in the early 1960s and presented the solo revue The World of Charles Aznavour at New York’s Ambassador Hotel in 1965, earning strong praise from both public and reviewers. By then he had released his first American album, also titled The World of Charles Aznavour, on Reprise Records, the label established by Frank Sinatra.
Aznavour himself would never equate his abilities with those of singers he most admired, such as Sinatra and Mel Tormé, instead regarding himself chiefly as a composer who also performed. His interpretive approach drew comparisons at various times to Maurice Chevalier and Sinatra, and his appeal remained steady across decades. Virtually every song he wrote explored facets of love, ranging from buoyant pieces such as “Après l’Amour” and “J’Ai Perdu la Tête” to the somber “J’en Déduis Que Je t’Aime” and “Bon Anniversaire.” A lifelong abstainer from alcohol and an avid motor-racing devotee, Aznavour married three times and fathered six children. He died on October 1, 2018, at the age of 94.
