His talent on screen no longer needs to be proven. Alain Delon was one of the sacred monsters of French cinema during his lifetime. Died on August 18, 2024, the Samurai leaves a great void behind him. In fact, to pay tribute to him, a symphonic film concert will take place in the coming weeks.
Indeed, on Friday November 8, the Palais des Congrès de Paris will host the show Delon: the last samurai. During this evening, Didier Barbelivien will sing an entirely new piece recorded by the actor during his lifetime. The first mentioned this song during his visit to Pascal Praud this Friday, November 1st.
On Europe 1the French singer-songwriter wanted to tell an anecdote about this unreleased title. He also recognized who did not believe for a single second in Alain Delon's talent as a singer.
Alain Delon in studio
“The story was originally to make a whole album which was going to be called 'Delon plays his classics'. And to do this I had to use prose, in text like a dialogue, that's what we intends there at the moment, to write not the biography of Alain but of things which were close to his heart and we had therefore begun the rewriting of his life through these songs, of which this one which is miraculously preserved”Didier Barbelivien first reminded Pascal Praud.
This recording took place around fifteen years ago according to the songwriter and it is one of his most impressive professional memories because Alain Delon managed to impress him: “And there he impressed me because how can I say at the beginning I gave him the text, I showed him the approximate time signature and I said ‘it’s not easy Alain, you’re going to have a hard time’. ‘Don’t worry , don't worry,' he replied..
Didier Barbelivien impressed by his talent
The actor who died on August 18 then returned to his estate in Douchy to rehearse. “And one morning he calls me and says I’m ready, I want to record”continues Didier Barbelivien who admits to having called his engineer to warn him: “I say to him, 'Tony we're going but we're going to row a little. He's going to record this afternoon. Plan that if you have a dinner to cancel it because we're going to be there for a while'”.
In the end, Alain Delon was able to impress all the teams. “He came, he didn't even have the text in hand. He put on the helmet. And he made a little adjustment. And he started to play us, because there is no other word, to play Cannes, the city of cinema (…) he may have stuck to a word, but it's no use , we would have redone the editing. And a third, of the same barrel”reveals the songwriter.
After these takes, Didier Barbelivien invited Alain Delon to come into the studio to talk about his work. “And he comes into the studio, as you can imagine, he runs his hand through his hair. He sits down, his eyes sparkle a little, he says to me 'so?'. I say 'so I don't know how you did it, but what you did is practically perfect'. He looks at me, he says 'I worked a lot'”. A beautiful memory for the songwriter, still impressed by the singing talents of the Samurai.
