French composer Jean-Michel Defaye, arranger for Léo Ferré, has died at the age of 92

French composer and arranger of most of Léo Ferré’s songs, Jean-Michel Defaye died on Wednesday 1^is January at the age of 92, as announced by his publisher, friend and musician Maurice Cevrero. Trained at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris, Jean-Michel Defaye quickly made a name for himself thanks to his ability to juggle styles and bring innovative nuances to film music, often by mixing classical orchestral music and modern elements.

His career at the Conservatory allowed him to win several prestigious prizes, notably the First Prize for composition in 1959. Helped by his friends Gérard Calvi and Michel Legrand, he very quickly moved towards variety, working at the very beginning as a musician in the troupe des Branquignols and their piece Ah! the beautiful bacchantes at the Daunou theater in Paris.

If classical composition has always been implicit, Jean-Michel Defaye subsequently devoted himself to the profession of arranger and conductor for the Polydor and Philips labels, for which he for a time borrowed the pseudonym of Franck Aussman, accompanying Catherine Sauvage, Francis Lemarque in Marjoram or Ricet Barrier in The servant of the castle. Over the years, several artists will call on Jean-Michel Defaye such as Zizi Jeanmaire with his hit My feather thingJuliette Gréco in The Javanese and of course Léo Ferré.

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Although he is best known for his film music compositions in the 1960s and 1970s, Jean-Michel Defaye has also explored contemporary music, electroacoustic music and television. In a field where music is often expected to be discreet, Defaye has managed to impose a strong signature, full of dynamism and orchestral richness.

Among his many collaborations with French directors, one of his most memorable works remains the film’s soundtrack Pouic-Pouic (1963), a comedy by Jean Girault which was a great success in France. Jean-Michel Defaye has created a particularly lively soundtrack, in line with the light, burlesque and absurd tone of the film. This released feature film tells the story of a slightly too gullible businessman who finds himself involved in a series of misadventures because of a hotel in difficulty. The humor of the film is largely based on visual gags, ridiculous situations and the impeccable acting of the actors, in particular that of the great Louis de Funès, whose talent for situation comedy was already well known. In this context, his music played an essential role in underlining and accentuating the comedy situations in this film.