Johnny Alliday: A Brief History of the French Rock Idol 1943-2017

Johnny Alliday, the revered rock star, “the French Elvis Presley,” died of lung cancer on Tuesday night, December 6, 2017, at the age of seventy-four. The following Saturday, a popular tribute was held for him. Seven hundred bikers rode down the Champs-Élysées in a gallop of honor to their idol, who was a passionate Harley-Davidson enthusiast.

The funeral procession followed the same route, from the Arc de Triomphe to the Place de la Concorde. BThe Church of the Magdalene The funeral ceremony was attended by French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte. Two former presidents also honored the occasion with their presence: Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife, singer Carla Bruni, and François Hollande and his partner, actress Julie Gayet.

Bye bye, Johnny, thank you, Johnny.

It was Emmanuel Macron who opened the eulogy for Johnny, who he called a French hero who brought American music to his homeland, followed by a series of other eulogies from the who's who of the local cultural elite, Johnny's close friends. About a million fans cheered their idol outside, shed tears, and sang with enthusiasm and joy mixed with sadness from his famous songs.

Johnny's musicians were also there to faithfully and deliberately play some of his hits. Leticia, Johnny's wife of twenty-three years, let about forty lucky people into the church from the crowd. There was a place in the Madeleine Church and Leticia has always liked her man's fans and treated them with respect. You could also see fans who imitated their idol in their style of dress and appearance. Johnny was one, unique and special, but he had quite a few doppelgangers.

כל France, or almost all of it, united with the memory of the one who accompanied the lives of four generations in his sweeping songs. France above, France below, right, left, center, intellectuals and workers, hard workers and white-collar workers, all united, at least for one day. Many of those present said they felt like they had lost a family member.

Johnny was human, simple, nice and generous. Even for those who didn't like his music, it was hard not to like him. His unique charm, expressed in his powerful voice, his muscular body, covered in tight leather clothes, decorated with crosses and other metal jewelry, his incredibly sexy movements and his amazing performances on stage, drove quite a few women, of all ages, crazy. Men also drew encouragement from him and admired him without limit.

In the Francophone world, Johnny was a phenomenon, an unparalleled stage creature. Who else, besides him, appeared on stage, in grandiose performances, in stadiums packed with tens of thousands of spectators, dangling from a cable from a helicopter? Who else, besides him, arrived on stage on a motorcycle or appeared on it inside a giant fist, spread out above the hall? On his fiftieth birthday, his fans were waiting for him to appear before them as usual, and here the groom of joy surprised them when he emerged from behind, from the exit, and cut the audience in two on his way to the stage.

And then a three-hour performance including duets with his first wife Sylvie Vertan, with their son David, with his fellow singers Eddie Mitchell and Michel Sardo, in a setting that resembled San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge. Light stunts, lanterns, spotlights and laser beams, crazy sets, which charged a huge budget - the imagination of Johnny and his crew, which was renewed, usually, every decade, was fertile, bold and boundary-breaking.

On Monday, Johnny's snow-white coffin was flown to a small cemetery on the island of St. Barthelemy. It was the deceased's wish. Johnny purchased a luxurious mansion on the billionaire's island where he spent a lot of time over the past ten years with his wife Letizia and their two adopted daughters. In a private ceremony attended by about forty family members and close friends, dressed in white, Johnny, whose real name was Jean-Philippe Smet, was buried in a modest grave, in the style of the other graves on the island.

Will Johnny's grave, next to a street, in the maritime cemetery on the island of St. Barthelemy become a place of pilgrimage for the idol's followers and the repose of the residents? It's hard to know. Many of the fans won't be able to afford the expensive eight-hour flight from France to the island. But who knows, there was already a precedent, even during the singer's lifetime.

On November 18, 1996, Johnny fulfilled a dream and gave a concert in Las Vegas, the city where he first saw his idol Elvis Presley on stage in 1974. Over five thousand fans arrived at the Aladdin Hotel-Casino on thirty-four charter planes, each named after a Johnny hit.

The American security guards gaped when they saw the enthusiastic fans coming out with religious devotion, armed with flags. “You followed me all the way here, you are amazing, I love you,” Johnny roared, singing first some of King’s songs and then some other American classics before moving on to his own repertoire. A historic concert at the Aladdin Theater, not the best in the singer’s career, who suffered from a sore throat that evening, and was also plagued by technical glitches, but it was symbolically important.

childhood

Whoever Johnny Alliday will be was born on June 15, 1943, in the XNUMXth arrondissement of Paris. His real name is Jean-Philippe Smet. The baby's father was a Belgian named Leon Smet, a husband cabaret, a dancer, singer, actor and producer, and his French mother, Yvette Keller, a hairdresser. Leon abandoned his partner and their eight-month-old baby, not without taking his son's bed with him.

The baby should sleep on the floor, the main thing is that Leon Smet earns a few pennies. Leon's cabaret is closed. Life is hard in occupied Paris. Mother Iguet is left without a livelihood, without a partner, and begins working as a cabin model at the haute couture house of Laven. She fears that she will not be able to raise her baby and entrusts him to Leon Smet's sister, Alain Mer, an actress and dancer.

Jean-Philippe Smet was an abandoned child and this tragedy would forever shape his life. Depressions that would afflict him, a nearly successful suicide attempt, all stemmed from his father's abandonment and his mother's distancing. The song Je suis né dans la rue, I was born on the street. (1969), expresses the inability to shake off, to heal the wound, despite the enormous success.

Only at the age of over fifty, when he met his last wife, Leticia, who was not yet twenty, would she give him what he had never been given before: a supportive and embracing love, long and loyal to the end and beyond.

When he enlisted in the army and was sent to Germany, he was suddenly informed that his father was waiting for him at the camp gate. Leon Smet came to see his already famous son, but again he set a trap for him. The father had planned the meeting, for money, with journalists from France Dimanche, paparazzi hungry for scoops, equipped with cameras, who had been ambushed in the field and emerged to capture the event as soon as Leon Smet pulled out a teddy bear.

Johnny's father was not interested in his son. And unlike Johnny, whose death was mourned by millions, who was accorded the honor of kings, Leon Smet's coffin was followed only by his son, Jean-Philippe Smet. Yes, the abandoned son paid for his father's hospitalization and burial expenses and came to his funeral. He was the only person to do so.

Leon Smet was a talented artist, actor, singer, dancer, radio broadcaster, television and theater director, promoter, and highly sought-after acting teacher (famous artists, such as Serge Reggiani, for example, came from France to Belgium to attend his classes), but his unstable personality and addiction to chasing women and alcohol ruined his life and caused him to end it as a poor, lonely man.

Johnny expressed the pain caused by his father's abandonment in the poignant song, A propos de mon père, About Avi (1974). Since he did not really know the one who gave him life and a name, he had no choice but to invent, to concoct, to imagine.

He forgave his mother, and opened his heart and home to her until her death. In the following link, TV host Jean-Pierre Foucault brings Leticia Allidey on stage. It is Johnny's birthday and his wife thanks him for her life with him and reminds him and the viewers of the peace pact she made with his mother, through her mediation. The couple will have another ten happy years ahead.

Little Jean-Philippe traveled with his adoptive aunt and her two dancer-actress daughters, Desta and Menen, throughout Europe. The boy began singing and acting in music hall shows featuring his two cousins ​​and Desta's husband, the American dancer Lee Halliday, who was always dressed in cowboy attire and a matching hat.

Lee, who chose the nickname “Halliday” after the family doctor who delivered him, used to call Jean-Philippe “Johnny,” the American equivalent of Jean. Johnny Halliday, Jean-Philippe’s stage name, was chosen, therefore, as a tribute to Lee Halliday, the husband of Desta, Johnny’s cousin, who had a child.

When they returned to Paris, Jean-Philippe enrolled in acting schools and learned to play the violin (hated and abandoned) and the guitar (loved and persevered). The boy attracted the attention of the decision-makers and influencers of the time with his voice and presence. After small roles in films and brief appearances on television, at the age of 14 he watched the film “To Love You” with Elvis Presley. It was a formative experience: Jean-Philippe discovered his calling – to be a rock singer, like Elvis.

The beginning of Johnny Hallyday's career

Lee Halliday, a father figure to Johnny who was his first producer, supported the boy's desire to become a rock singer and bought him records in America that were then impossible to obtain in France. Together with Eddie Mitchell, his good friend, his "brother", who shared his love of American rock, Johnny listened to many hours of the revered music.

Starting in 1958, Johnny, along with Eddie Mitchell, Jacques Dutron and others, frequented the first rock disco in Paris, the “temple” of rock, Le Golf-Drouot, 2 rue Drouot, in the 14th arrondissement. The beginning was not easy due to the strong resistance in France to the import of American rock. On March 1960, XNUMX, Johnny's first album, Hello Johnny, was released, whose lead song, T'aimer follement To love you madly (1960), a cover of Floyd Robinson's hit, "Make Love," competed with Delilah's version (it wasn't the only song that the singer and the singer, who would both become legends, competed on...).

https://youtu.be/2cKxDrFeW-s

With the support of Lynne Renault, who introduced him to a then-famous television show in which veteran artists recommended young singers, the young Johnny burst into the spotlight, despite the conservatism of the audience and the media, who still believed that American rock had no future in France. Johnny proved otherwise with his daring performance of the song Laisse les filles. Leave the girls alone. (1960), causing a scandal and boosting the album's sales, from thirty thousand copies to one hundred thousand, in just a few days. The shy guy who answered Lin Renault with a terse yes and no, miraculously removed his inhibitions when he burst into song and knelt down, rolling on the floor with his guitar. Who had ever seen such a spectacle in France at that time?

https://youtu.be/7V2nY3xMENM

Memories memories Memories, memories (1960), Johnny's first major success, opens the way for him. Shows throughout France and the beginning of the collective hysteria phenomenon around him that will only grow stronger and stronger. The opponents will not have the upper hand.

On February 24, 1961, the first international rock concert was held at the Palais des Sports in Paris, centered around Johnny Alliday, in an electrifying and tense atmosphere, accompanied by seat-breaking, violent fights and arrests. Rock's status was established and the eighteen-year-old Johnny was established as a star. A legal dispute with his first record label, Vogue, caused him to slam the door and sign with Philips.

The idol of the masses Johnny appears at the mythical Olympia Hall in Paris, publicizes the twist and at the same time also begins to sing sentimental songs, on the advice of Charles Aznavour, who was among his most loyal friends. Retiens la nuit Stop the night. (1961) is one of his most moving and tender love songs.

Album follows album, success follows success. In 1963, he celebrated a triumph in the film “Where Do You Come From, Johnny?”, a French-style Western, in which he acted and sang alongside his future wife, the singer Sylvie Vertan. Le pénitencier Prison (1964), an adaptation of The House of the Rising Sun, with a completely different transcription, is one of his historical hits.

On April 12, 1965, he married the sweet, talented, and admired blonde singer, Sylvie Vertan, a Ye Ye idol, like him, a Frenchwoman from Bulgaria, now living in the United States. A year later, their son David was born. David Smet, known as David Eliday, is now a respected singer, musician, and actor in his own right.

A difficult time

The audience was less fond of the rhythm and blues genre that Johnny turned to and his success waned slightly. The hippie-looking singer Antoine mocked him in one of his songs in which he called for him to be imprisoned in a cage at the Medrano Circus, and Johnny did not remain unmoved and answered him with his own song, Cheveux longs idées courtes Long hair, short mind (1966).

But Johnny, in his early twenties, running from one show to another across Europe, is at a loss, the tax authorities are demanding a large sum from him, Sylvie is demanding a divorce. His career has taken off again, but depression and self-loathing that have attacked him have caused him to attempt suicide, which fortunately did not succeed.

Johnny was rushed to the hospital in critical condition but came back to life. Noir c'est noir Black is black. (1966), an adaptation of Black is Black, would translate his feelings at that moment and become a huge hit, second only to Prison. The star's songwriters often knew how to get into his skin and hit the mark.

Revival

Sylvie Vertan decided, in the end, to stay with her husband and even went on tour with him in South America. The couple would only divorce fifteen years later. Meanwhile, Johnny had somewhat abandoned rock and roll to absorb the influence of rhythm and blues, hippie music, pop music, soul, psychedelic rock. Albums and performances at a crazy pace, wild nights of partying without sleep, accidents, fainting, injuries, cocaine here and there, alcohol and always smoking. Johnny would pay for this later when lung cancer attacked him at the age of seventy-four, spreading and not letting up.

Intense rock and protest songs

After a tour of Canada and France in April 1969, Johnny gives the audience his first grandiose show at the Palais des Sports, from April 26 to May 5. In front of a hundred thousand enthusiastic spectators, he transforms into a boxer and sings Caché derrière mes poings Hidden behind my fists (1969), a song saluting the sport of wrestling.

That I love you How much I love you (1969), will make a huge impression and remain a historic hit that causes hysteria and fainting spells.

Ballads, Country and Rock and Roll

Johnny connects with new musicians and releases blues-rock records, innovative for the time. He turns to Philippe LeBrou and Jacques Lanzmann, who renew the themes of the songs, post-68 protest songs that speak of the generation gap and the danger of nuclear weapons. Philippe LeBrou's song, Jésus Christ Jesus Christ (1970), arouses the ire of the Vatican. Philip LeBrou noticed during his travels in the US the hippies' imagination of Jesus of Nazareth, hence the idea to say in his poem that if Jesus were alive today, he would probably walk around as a hippie with braided hair, smoke marijuana, attend the Woodstock festival and love topless girls.

In 1972, lyricist Michel Mallory came in, replacing Philippe Lebreau and writing or arranging about a hundred songs for Johnny over the course of ten years. The intense rock gave way to more delicate and intimate music. Among the greatest successes of the period is La musique que j'aime
The music I like (1973), which Johnny composed, for a change, himself.

I have a problem I have a problem. (1973), a duet with Sylvie Vertan, will remain a historic hit, reflecting the relationship between the couple, who, incidentally, remained friends until the end.

After the tax authorities demanded a refund of hundreds of millions of francs from Johnny, the singer, devastated, finds refuge in the United States with his wife Sylvie and son David. He decides to leave everything behind but returns to France in 1976 and continues as always. The star's life is busy as usual with shows, recordings, some of them in Los Angeles, albums and projects.

In November of that year, Johnny released a concept album, Hamlet, inspired by Shakespeare's tragedy, in a progressive rock style, accompanied by an orchestra of one hundred and fifty players. The double album was a commercial failure and the idea of ​​putting it on stage as a musical was abandoned. Other hits drove the audience crazy, including Gabrielle Gabriel (1976)

I forgot to live I forgot to live. (1977)

She forgets me. She forgets me. (1978)

My mouth My face, what's wrong with my face? (1978)

Pierre Naçabal, the composer of the song "My Face," took his own life under particularly puzzling circumstances. The song was a great success, and the composer, who was sure that he would soon receive the royalties, bought a house. After being accused of plagiarism and the court blocked his royalties, he fell into a deep depression and committed suicide. The tragic event naturally caused great sorrow for Johnny.

A year later, the court acquitted Pierre Nezval of all charges. Too late. Pierre Beaune replaced Michel Mallory as lyricist and artistic director. Inspired by him, Johnny released eight albums and although none of their songs became hits, the collaboration with Pierre Beaune is considered creative and original.

In 1979, Johnny surprised the audience at the Fabien de Pré, dressed in a gold jumpsuit and wearing glasses that projected laser beams at the spectators. It was a futuristic show inspired by the film Star Wars, originally intended to entertain Johnny's son, David. The show was called The Angel with the Laser Eyes and is the eponymous song. L'ange aux yeux de laser The angel with the laser eyes.

From September 14 to November 18, 1982, Johnny conquered the Palais des Sports in an apocalyptic show called The Survivor, inspired by the film Mad Max.

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That same year, 1982, Johnny fell head over heels in love with the intellectual and serene actress Natalie Bay, who completely changed his image and life. Johnny, with short hair and clothes that were the same, almost chic, goes to bed early and spends his time between Paris and Natalie's country house.

This convinced Jean-Luc Godard to give Johnny a role in his film Detective (1984) and also influenced her partner's music. She introduced him to Michel Berger, who wrote, among other things, the immortal hit Quelque chose de Tennessee.
Something from Tennessee (1985). The reference is, of course, to the American playwright Tennessee Williams, of whom something, the dream of achieving infinity and the burning desire to live, is found in everyone.

The intellectual elite, which had previously looked down on Johnny, changed its attitude towards the idol of the masses, and his surprising marriage to Natalie Bay bore fruit. At the end of 1983, Johnny and Natalie's daughter Laura Smet was born, who is now a respected actress in her own right. Jean-Jacques Goldman wrote hits for him, including Laura, a song dedicated to Johnny's daughter. In 1986, the idyll with the calm Natalie ended and Johnny returned to being a stormy and irredeemably badass rocker.

Leticia Alliday

Besides endless adventures and numerous novels, Johnny was officially married to four women: to Sylvie in 1965, divorced in 1980, to a model named Elisabeth, known as Babette, in 1981, a marriage that lasted less than three months, to an actress named Adeline (the daughter of his good friend, Christian Blondio, a musician and lyricist who wrote or arranged forty-two songs for him), twice, from 1990 to 1992, and a second time in 1994, to divorce a year later. But the woman of his life was undoubtedly Leticia, whom he married in 1996, when he was already fifty-two years old and she was more than thirty years younger than him.

At a restaurant in Miami, Johnny met a friend's daughter, a nineteen-year-old girl, and knew immediately that she was the one he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. A year later, in 1996, they were married by Nicolas Sarkozy, then mayor of Nice. Leticia Boudoir, whose parents had divorced when she was twelve, decided to move to Miami with her father, a down-on-her-luck nightclub owner, to nurse him out of severe depression and suicidal thoughts.

The girl saved her father but paid for it with eating disorders that prevented her from having children. Together with Johnny, she adopted a Vietnamese baby girl, Jade, in 2004, and four years later, Joy, also from Vietnam. Johnny, who did not participate in raising David and Laura, is tasting the joys of fatherhood after the age of fifty.

Leticia has transformed from a shy girl into an opinionated and determined businesswoman, managing her husband's career with a firm hand, pushing away those close to him and bringing closer those who are far away, guiding his path with endless love and support. The song Light the fire. (1998), Allumez le feu, written by singer Zazie and composed by Pascal Obispo and Pierre Jacconelli, excites the masses with a positive frenzy of boisterous dancing and intense joy.

The album he composed for Johnny's son David, Blood for Blood (1999), was a great success, selling over two million copies. Here is his eponymous song, Sang pour Sang Blood for Blood (1999).

On June 10, 2000, Johnny gave a huge free concert at the foot of the Eiffel Tower, in front of half a million spectators on site and eight million at home in front of the television screen, to celebrate a forty-year career. On July 14, 2009, another concert at the foot of the Eiffel Tower, in front of seven hundred thousand spectators, to celebrate the “Tour 66”, named after the historic Route 66 in the USA.

The song, Marie (2002), written for Johnny by composer-lyricist-singer Gerald de Palmas, sold XNUMX million copies, a record number for a single. A young soldier turns to Marie and painfully tells her that the next day he will be killed in an absurd battle because of the madness of humanity's wars.

Johnny lives a flamboyant life, investing in dubious businesses, such as a failed and temporary nightclub founded by Leticia's father in Montparnasse, spending huge sums on luxuries, entertainment and gifts for his close associates. He leaves his record company, Universal, under the influence of the same consultant Ahithophel, Leticia's father, after a legal confrontation and signs with Warner.

His health was deteriorating, colon cancer followed by a herniated disc, but the surgeries he underwent were supposed to ensure his return to normal. In 2009, France held her breath. Johnny returned to his home in Los Angeles, where he had lived in relative obscurity for the past few years, but was rushed to the city hospital due to an infection he had apparently contracted during his last surgery in Paris. Johnny underwent another operation and after a week in an induced coma, France breathed a sigh of relief again. The star returned to Paris, in a wheelchair, but alive.

Johnny recovered and got up, continued his activities and returned to his roots, namely rock and blues. In 2012 he gave performances in Montpellier and the Stade de France, which continued abroad, Montreal, New York, London, Moscow and… Nokia Hall, one concert in Israel, on October 30. This was his only visit to the country, where he prayed at the Western Wall and was received by President Shimon Peres.

It should be noted that Johnny Alliday never hid his sympathy for and support for Israel despite hostile pressures exerted on him. Johnny had many friends, both Jewish and Israeli, and on June 1, 1967, before the outbreak of the Six-Day War, he participated in a show in support of Israel organized by the Jewish community in Paris. The singer even considered coming to Israel, but the war ended before he could fulfill his intention and the visit was postponed.

And again an active and turbulent life, a tour in the US, albums, revivals, shows in France. The lung cancer broke out nine months before his death. In June and July 2017, Johnny, despite the illness, went on a tour of France, Belgium and Switzerland with his friends from his youth, Eddie Mitchell and Jacques Dutron, and together they sang some of their famous songs.

The trio, which has already given three concerts at Bercy in early November 2014, is called Les Vieilles canailles, the old brats, for this purpose and was inspired by the Rat Pack, the group of rats – Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr., who performed in the XNUMXs. The name also nods to Serge Gainsbourg's famous song Vieille canaille, Old brat (1979), a French adaptation of You Rascal You. In 1986, Serge recorded the song with Eddie Mitchell in a new arrangement.

At the end of nine months of courageous struggle, on December 6, 2017, in the early morning, Jean-Philippe Smet – Johnny Alliday, who was a devout Catholic, his face turned to heaven, returned his soul to his Creator, at his estate in Marne-la-Coquet, west of Paris.

Johnny forever

The years passed, fashion changed, and Johnny remained. Not the same Johnny, but not a different Johnny either. Johnny will remain in France forever. A career of almost sixty years, one thousand and one hundred songs, fifty albums, sales of more than one hundred million discs, huge shows, a turbulent private life that kept the People tabloids busy.

A mass funeral and eulogy by French President Emmanuel Macron, who salutes his immortal contribution to the country and thanks him on behalf of the entire nation: Jean-Philippe Smet, a young Belgian who chose an Anglo-Saxon stage name, brought the blues of African-American soul and the rock and roll of Nashville to France, making the French people in all corners of the country love them. A mission that seemed impossible. But, despite everything and contrary to expectations, this is a French destiny.

Did you like the article? Would you like to read more biographies of French singers written about by Dr. Orna Lieberman?

• Michel Berger, the father of French pop
• Leo Marjan – Music Hall Legend
• Delilah Forever – The Dramatic Life of the Singer Who Became a Legend
• Michel Delfez – The Troubadour Who Sings From the Heart