Sacha Distel dies

[brownie]

Singer and jazz guitarist Sacha Distel died this afternoon at the home of his wife's parents where he was currently staying in Le Royal-Canadel, southern France, it was just announced. He was 71.

Distel was discussed in various threads here including this one:

http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php...hl=sacha+distel

Sacha Distel was very popular in France. News of his death is prime news on the radio news broadcasts.

[king ubu]

Very sad news! Wow, Distel and Jacquet, and we notice at almost the same minute

[couw]

sad indeed.

have a good time up there.

[WD45]

RIP

[king ubu]

RIP

This is a GREAT album! Everybody better pick it up as long as it's around!

Some of the best Wilen of that period, and great Lewis, too!

[mikeweil]

And I was just beginning to check out his music! Very sad news!

One of the darkest days this year: Illinois Jacquet, James Williams, Jerry Goldsmith and Sacha Distel ...

Anyone knows a good online source for the Lewis CD?

[JohnJ]

Brownie, Sacha Distel was very popular in England when I was young, but as a singer not a jazz guitarist. I doubt most Brits even knew he played guitar. The following obituary is from the Guardian.

Britain's favourite French crooner dies in St-Tropez

Jon Henley in Paris

Friday July 23, 2004

The Guardian

Sacha Distel, the quintessential Gallic crooner, died yesterday at the home of his parents-in-law near Saint-Tropez in the south of France, his record company said.

A spokesman for Universal Music France said the singer, France's best-known playboy charmer through most of the 1960s and 70s, died "following a long illness", the standard French euphemism for cancer. He was 71.

In the course of a 45-year international career launched in part by a brief 1958 affair with Brigitte Bardot, Distel performed with some of the biggest names in music, including Dizzy Gillespie, Lionel Hampton, Liza Minnelli, Quincy Jones and Dionne Warwick.

Britain always had a soft spot for him. Distel first hit number one in the UK charts - and stayed there for 34 weeks - with Raindrops Keep Fallin' on my Head in 1971, after headlining at the London Palladium and Prince of Wales theatre.

He topped the bill at no fewer than three royal command performances. On the back of his successful Sacha Show on French TV, he became a regular guest - and frequent host - on British chat shows. Distel's most recent appearance in Britain was in 2001, as Billy Flynn in the hit musical Chicago.

Distel, as much the face of French music as Johnny Hallyday, Maurice Chevalier and Charles Aznavour, had a succession of huge French hits beginning with perhaps his best-known song of all, Scoubidou, and continuing with Scandale dans la Famille, Monsieur Cannibale and Chanson Bleue. But he also turned out hit Gallic versions of American standards.

Born in Paris in 1933, Distel was the son of Leo Distel, an engineer, and Andrée Ventura, a concert-trained pianist and the sister of a successful French prewar bandleader, Ray Ventura.

The young Sacha as good as grew up backstage with his uncle, who ensured that one of his musicians - Henri Salvador, who had a number one hit in France as late as last summer - gave him his first guitar lessons at the age of 13.

In 1948, Distel was in the audience at Dizzy Gillespie's first concert in Paris and was bitten by the jazz bug. He was named best amateur jazz guitarist in 1951. Two years later he was voted top professional jazz guitarist, a title he held for the next seven years while accompanying the likes of Juliette Greco, then flourishing in the clubs of St-Germain-des-Pres.

His first album, French New Sound, was recorded with Lionel Hampton in 1955 and he featured as a guitarist on the legendary jazz album Afternoon in Paris, recorded by the Modern Jazz Quartet in 1955.

Desperate to launch himself on a singing career in the wake of his idol Frank Sinatra, Distel finally took the plunge in 1958 with Scoubidou, which became a youth anthem in France and remains one of his best-known hits. By the next summer he had an invitation to appear on the Ed Sullivan show.

Distel married a French downhill skiing champion, Francine Bréaud, in 1963, and is survived by her and by their two sons.

· He will be buried in a private ceremony in France next week.

[JohnS]

Sacha's passing was headline news in the UK, musical tribute as well. His jazz legacy was small but intruiging. I heard him recently on BBC's "Desert Island Discs", he seemed a charming man with a deep interest in jazz.