I Sing

Abstract In 1964, at the start of his rise as a film composer, Legrand decides he would like to try singing. He used to sing as a child with his sister Christiane, who went on to become a famous soprano. He writes the music for the songs, and the lyrics are penned by Eddy Marnay, an “enigmatic character” who “never sleeps, merely dozes.” Legrand admits that singing, for him, is a source of glorious, self-indulgent pleasure; he particularly loves scat. His first vocal album is a commercial failure, but his record company encourages him to try again. In 1965, Jacques Brel asks Legrand to sing the opening set of his concert in Montreal. Legrand agrees, and Brel teaches him about the art of performance: body language, lighting, and so on. On the night of the concert, Legrand is gripped by stage fright but makes it through. In 1971, he is asked to write music for a film adapted from a Françoise Sagan novel: at a dinner party in her apartment, he plays the theme he has written to Sagan, who is immediately inspired to write lyrics for it: their only collaboration.