Post by davidhr on Aug 30, 2011 7:33:12 GMT -5
Lara is now back in Brussels, and a few interactions with her hometown audience are on the agenda.
Yesterday was the day Lara was scheduled to record her contribution to the 20th anniversary of the Belgian radio station Bel RTL. The program hosted by Philippe Bouvard is to be broadcast September 2nd and is called "Lara dans les Grosses Têtes" (the equivalent of ‘talking heads’ in English speaking countries). Lara’s FB site even includes notice of the show on her ‘wall’, listing the times of her appearance as between 1600 and 1800 hours (a number of other guests are to be present as well). No information has surfaced yet concerning the taping, though by this time next week, we’ll know what went on. It can be heard live on www.belrtl.be and will perhaps be available after the fact on NABBOX, if nowhere else.
Bel RTL is also involved in Lara’s next project, her concert in Charleroi, Belgium on September 22 to benefit the "Fondation Papillon". This show is becoming a big deal: The radio station's advertisement for it is now running, and can be seen at:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=sviBqFb9hL4&
Some 2000 reservations have already been made. The webpage for the concert site (Spiroudome in Chareleroi) indicates they can hold 6300. Apparently the 700 ‘business seats’ are almost all gone.
As indicated on their foundation webpage, the aim of 'Papillon' is "to create a resolutely contemporary infrastructure for the reception of orphaned children, or place them in a suitable building, strengthening existing structures which are often inappropriate and overcrowded”. It fits in nicely with Lara’s concern for children, and also with her interactions with this Belgian station.
The website for the foundation is also advertising the concert. My guess is that none of Lara’s people have paid much attention to what they’re saying, for the site lists the event (in translation) as “the first concert before her tour in Russia”. Originally of course this was supposed to be the kick-off concert for the ‘Mlle. Zhivago’ tour covering Russia and the Ukraine (since cancelled), but perhaps of equal importance, it has been thought of as Lara’s chance to officially introduce Belgians to the Mlle. Zhivago songs. As one can see in the promo link above, nothing about Mlle. Zhivago is mentioned. The omission may not be meaningful – with no album release in that country, it wouldn’t necessarily be a selling point anyway – but it will be very interesting to see what Lara’s set list ends up being. It’s hard to remember her giving a concert involving songs from an album not yet released in that locale. [Even for EWIM, she at least had it available for sale in the concert hall. We’ll see if that happens with ‘Mlle. Zhivago’.]
Without doing anything new, Lara still occasionally pops up on TV in France, this past week on France TV4 in a program entitled "Vos chanteurs préférés". It was a rebroadcast of a show that originally aired in 2009, in which she sang a duet of ‘Tu es mon autre’ and received a gold disc for “TLFM’.
The sound engineer Rob Mancuso shot video of Lara during her trip to Israel (for several concerts) in the spring of 2010. He’s made some of this available on youtube, at:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0ZpgLnFwvE
It includes a great impromptu version of Lara, Gerard and her team singing “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” (I wonder if he had to get Disney’s permission before uploading this video … ).
Elisa Vidal made available photos from the Morgan David awards show that took place back in June. They include a few gorgeous photos of Lara (easily identifiable in her brilliant red dress) at
picasaweb.google.com/111446217240281056203/MaguenDavidDOr?authkey=Gv1sRgCP6Bgq3dpsKDaQ&feat=email
Statistics from Russia indicate that the Mlle. Zhivago CD was 6th highest in sales during the first six months of the year. It has earned a gold record but not platinum, which means it has sold between 25,000 and 50,000 copies, officially. [This probably represents an underestimate; as noted previously, there is considerable skepticism about the inclusiveness of the reported sales figures in that country, although ‘officially’ the claim is they represent some 75% of all transactions]. Given that Mlle. Zhivago has now dropped out of the top 25, and with no tour to help support it, the full year position will clearly be much lower.
The FB site ‘Lara Fabian est ton autre’ published some figures from Alan Badoev’s website concerning the ‘Mlle. Zhivago’ film. It was noted that for a cost of more than $3 million, 480 hours of video were shot, and more than 20,000 pictures taken. And yet there is still no definitive word concerning the movie’s availability. Badoev’s website currently seems concerned with other projects, videos primarily, and almost certainly none of them have required the expenditure of this movie. That economics continues to provide hope that “delay does not imply denial” and we will eventually see it.
The Lara Fabian Romanian channel has been uploading to youtube some short videos of Lara’s past interviews, with English subtitles. As usual she responds to questions with very honest comments – don’t miss them.
And now the next segment from the biography of Lara, pp. 201-205. This is continuing on with the TLFM experience.
**There were several songs Lara had wanted to include, and hence several singers she wanted to pay homage to, but for one reason or another it didn’t work out.
**She had thought of using “Une femme amoureuse” sung by Mireille Mathieu in 1980 – which was an adaptation of Barbra Streisand’s “Woman in Love”. The book concludes that it did not end up fitting in the project (no explanation given).
**Lara had also wanted to use the background music from Mylene Farmer’s “Libertine” – and in fact, rumors had this in the album – but the problem was she didn’t want to use the lyrics, which she said she could never get her arms around them. Instead, given that she thought of Mylene as a symbol of rebellion, Lara wanted to recite the words of the Charter of the Rights of Women. To alter the song that way required permission, which was not granted. Hence the Charter, or a portion of it, is simply given in the liner notes on the album.
**As we all know, Lara originally wanted to take all of these songs and redo the arrangements to include more sophisticated styles, jazz, R n’B, classical components. To this end she worked first with Matt Herskowitz and his trio in Montreal. As we also know very well, the album was rejected by Pascal Negre, who thought that (a) it was too sophisticated for Lara’s fans, who would be expecting something different; and (b) he could barely hear Lara in the album. He thought she was hiding so as to appease critics of her vocal power, critics who were leading her down the wrong path. She said his telling her this opened her eyes and changed her life. [The alternate path that Pascal Negre pushed her onto ultimately has led to “Mlle. Zhivago” and its return to Lara’s more emotional/extreme range vocal dynamics, ironically without Pascal Negre’s backing.]
**Of course, that was not before Lara had rented out the Bouglione Circus location in Brussels in October of 2008 to present six of the original recordings to her fans. This unreleased album came to be thought of as ‘TLFM1”.
**Hence the next try had Lara singing with more power to background arrangements by Simon Climie, a well-known producer of modern pop/blues sounds (Eric Clapton, Aretha Franklin, etc.). His advantage, in her eyes, was that he was not familiar with the originals, and therefore was not a “guardian of the temple”. She still wanted to update the sound to be more modern, and furthermore wanted them all to have a certain commonality so that they could be stylistically part of the same album. Quite a chore given the disparate nature of the originals. Critics thought these arrangements too simplistic.
**Lara’s letters to the individual singers to whom she was paying homage were not originally meant to be shown to the public, just mailed to the singers themselves (which did happen). But she reconsidered, getting advice that they would be a worthwhile addition. And so they were – the letters got as much publicity as the album, it turned out. They also were a way to let her fans understand her better, given their honest admittance of weakness, their show of tenderness (and, as well, her intelligence and profundity).
**Lara did get some responses from the singers – mentioned here in particular is France Gall, who was delighted (and astonished) that Lara chose to include ‘Babacar’ (as a digital download). In 2008, Lara came at the invitation of Ms. Gall to sing “La chanson de Stella Spotlight” for the 30 year anniversary of ‘Starmania’ (Lara has always been a big fan of Michel Berger).
**The author is confident that TLFM1 will someday see the light of day, given Lara’s respect for Matt Herskowitz, and her expressed love for that version of the album. And there’s certainly a good chance it would have gotten a better reception from Lara’s critics. The author also thinks that Lara will one day release “Tutti la donna in me”, the Italian version of her songs of homage to female singers, with both of these discs perhaps showing up on Lara’s (now essentially defunct) website, as EWIM did.
Arguing against this is Lara’s well known penchant for never looking back (she even said she refused a subsequent world-wide release of ‘A Wonderful Life’, saying its time had passed). We don’t hear much about TLFM1 anymore… If Lara is looking for a new project - now that she would appear to have time on her hands - perhaps, as a gift for fans who paid money to her fan club and have gotten nothing in return this year, she could make one or both of these discs available to them. I don’t think we should hold our breath…
Presumably Lara will be putting together her upcoming concert back home in Belgium in the next few weeks. The songs she chooses, and perhaps her interview on Bel RTL, will tell us a lot about her future plans.
David
Yesterday was the day Lara was scheduled to record her contribution to the 20th anniversary of the Belgian radio station Bel RTL. The program hosted by Philippe Bouvard is to be broadcast September 2nd and is called "Lara dans les Grosses Têtes" (the equivalent of ‘talking heads’ in English speaking countries). Lara’s FB site even includes notice of the show on her ‘wall’, listing the times of her appearance as between 1600 and 1800 hours (a number of other guests are to be present as well). No information has surfaced yet concerning the taping, though by this time next week, we’ll know what went on. It can be heard live on www.belrtl.be and will perhaps be available after the fact on NABBOX, if nowhere else.
Bel RTL is also involved in Lara’s next project, her concert in Charleroi, Belgium on September 22 to benefit the "Fondation Papillon". This show is becoming a big deal: The radio station's advertisement for it is now running, and can be seen at:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=sviBqFb9hL4&
Some 2000 reservations have already been made. The webpage for the concert site (Spiroudome in Chareleroi) indicates they can hold 6300. Apparently the 700 ‘business seats’ are almost all gone.
As indicated on their foundation webpage, the aim of 'Papillon' is "to create a resolutely contemporary infrastructure for the reception of orphaned children, or place them in a suitable building, strengthening existing structures which are often inappropriate and overcrowded”. It fits in nicely with Lara’s concern for children, and also with her interactions with this Belgian station.
The website for the foundation is also advertising the concert. My guess is that none of Lara’s people have paid much attention to what they’re saying, for the site lists the event (in translation) as “the first concert before her tour in Russia”. Originally of course this was supposed to be the kick-off concert for the ‘Mlle. Zhivago’ tour covering Russia and the Ukraine (since cancelled), but perhaps of equal importance, it has been thought of as Lara’s chance to officially introduce Belgians to the Mlle. Zhivago songs. As one can see in the promo link above, nothing about Mlle. Zhivago is mentioned. The omission may not be meaningful – with no album release in that country, it wouldn’t necessarily be a selling point anyway – but it will be very interesting to see what Lara’s set list ends up being. It’s hard to remember her giving a concert involving songs from an album not yet released in that locale. [Even for EWIM, she at least had it available for sale in the concert hall. We’ll see if that happens with ‘Mlle. Zhivago’.]
Without doing anything new, Lara still occasionally pops up on TV in France, this past week on France TV4 in a program entitled "Vos chanteurs préférés". It was a rebroadcast of a show that originally aired in 2009, in which she sang a duet of ‘Tu es mon autre’ and received a gold disc for “TLFM’.
The sound engineer Rob Mancuso shot video of Lara during her trip to Israel (for several concerts) in the spring of 2010. He’s made some of this available on youtube, at:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0ZpgLnFwvE
It includes a great impromptu version of Lara, Gerard and her team singing “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” (I wonder if he had to get Disney’s permission before uploading this video … ).
Elisa Vidal made available photos from the Morgan David awards show that took place back in June. They include a few gorgeous photos of Lara (easily identifiable in her brilliant red dress) at
picasaweb.google.com/111446217240281056203/MaguenDavidDOr?authkey=Gv1sRgCP6Bgq3dpsKDaQ&feat=email
Statistics from Russia indicate that the Mlle. Zhivago CD was 6th highest in sales during the first six months of the year. It has earned a gold record but not platinum, which means it has sold between 25,000 and 50,000 copies, officially. [This probably represents an underestimate; as noted previously, there is considerable skepticism about the inclusiveness of the reported sales figures in that country, although ‘officially’ the claim is they represent some 75% of all transactions]. Given that Mlle. Zhivago has now dropped out of the top 25, and with no tour to help support it, the full year position will clearly be much lower.
The FB site ‘Lara Fabian est ton autre’ published some figures from Alan Badoev’s website concerning the ‘Mlle. Zhivago’ film. It was noted that for a cost of more than $3 million, 480 hours of video were shot, and more than 20,000 pictures taken. And yet there is still no definitive word concerning the movie’s availability. Badoev’s website currently seems concerned with other projects, videos primarily, and almost certainly none of them have required the expenditure of this movie. That economics continues to provide hope that “delay does not imply denial” and we will eventually see it.
The Lara Fabian Romanian channel has been uploading to youtube some short videos of Lara’s past interviews, with English subtitles. As usual she responds to questions with very honest comments – don’t miss them.
And now the next segment from the biography of Lara, pp. 201-205. This is continuing on with the TLFM experience.
**There were several songs Lara had wanted to include, and hence several singers she wanted to pay homage to, but for one reason or another it didn’t work out.
**She had thought of using “Une femme amoureuse” sung by Mireille Mathieu in 1980 – which was an adaptation of Barbra Streisand’s “Woman in Love”. The book concludes that it did not end up fitting in the project (no explanation given).
**Lara had also wanted to use the background music from Mylene Farmer’s “Libertine” – and in fact, rumors had this in the album – but the problem was she didn’t want to use the lyrics, which she said she could never get her arms around them. Instead, given that she thought of Mylene as a symbol of rebellion, Lara wanted to recite the words of the Charter of the Rights of Women. To alter the song that way required permission, which was not granted. Hence the Charter, or a portion of it, is simply given in the liner notes on the album.
**As we all know, Lara originally wanted to take all of these songs and redo the arrangements to include more sophisticated styles, jazz, R n’B, classical components. To this end she worked first with Matt Herskowitz and his trio in Montreal. As we also know very well, the album was rejected by Pascal Negre, who thought that (a) it was too sophisticated for Lara’s fans, who would be expecting something different; and (b) he could barely hear Lara in the album. He thought she was hiding so as to appease critics of her vocal power, critics who were leading her down the wrong path. She said his telling her this opened her eyes and changed her life. [The alternate path that Pascal Negre pushed her onto ultimately has led to “Mlle. Zhivago” and its return to Lara’s more emotional/extreme range vocal dynamics, ironically without Pascal Negre’s backing.]
**Of course, that was not before Lara had rented out the Bouglione Circus location in Brussels in October of 2008 to present six of the original recordings to her fans. This unreleased album came to be thought of as ‘TLFM1”.
**Hence the next try had Lara singing with more power to background arrangements by Simon Climie, a well-known producer of modern pop/blues sounds (Eric Clapton, Aretha Franklin, etc.). His advantage, in her eyes, was that he was not familiar with the originals, and therefore was not a “guardian of the temple”. She still wanted to update the sound to be more modern, and furthermore wanted them all to have a certain commonality so that they could be stylistically part of the same album. Quite a chore given the disparate nature of the originals. Critics thought these arrangements too simplistic.
**Lara’s letters to the individual singers to whom she was paying homage were not originally meant to be shown to the public, just mailed to the singers themselves (which did happen). But she reconsidered, getting advice that they would be a worthwhile addition. And so they were – the letters got as much publicity as the album, it turned out. They also were a way to let her fans understand her better, given their honest admittance of weakness, their show of tenderness (and, as well, her intelligence and profundity).
**Lara did get some responses from the singers – mentioned here in particular is France Gall, who was delighted (and astonished) that Lara chose to include ‘Babacar’ (as a digital download). In 2008, Lara came at the invitation of Ms. Gall to sing “La chanson de Stella Spotlight” for the 30 year anniversary of ‘Starmania’ (Lara has always been a big fan of Michel Berger).
**The author is confident that TLFM1 will someday see the light of day, given Lara’s respect for Matt Herskowitz, and her expressed love for that version of the album. And there’s certainly a good chance it would have gotten a better reception from Lara’s critics. The author also thinks that Lara will one day release “Tutti la donna in me”, the Italian version of her songs of homage to female singers, with both of these discs perhaps showing up on Lara’s (now essentially defunct) website, as EWIM did.
Arguing against this is Lara’s well known penchant for never looking back (she even said she refused a subsequent world-wide release of ‘A Wonderful Life’, saying its time had passed). We don’t hear much about TLFM1 anymore… If Lara is looking for a new project - now that she would appear to have time on her hands - perhaps, as a gift for fans who paid money to her fan club and have gotten nothing in return this year, she could make one or both of these discs available to them. I don’t think we should hold our breath…
Presumably Lara will be putting together her upcoming concert back home in Belgium in the next few weeks. The songs she chooses, and perhaps her interview on Bel RTL, will tell us a lot about her future plans.
David