Jeanne Mas
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Jeanne Mas | ||
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| Background information | ||
| Born | 28 February 1958 | |
| Origin | Alicante, Spain | |
| Genre(s) | Electropop Pop music Rock |
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| Occupation(s) | Singer, songwriter, actress | |
| Years active | 1978–present | |
| Label(s) | Pathé Marconi EMI AB Productions Arcade Music XIII Bis Records Red Rocks Productions |
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| Website | Official site | |
Jeanne Mas, born on 28 February 1958 in Alicante, Spain, is a French pop singer and actress.
She is well-known in France, Switzerland and Belgium for her numerous hit singles released in the 1980's. Her first success was "Toute première fois" in 1984. This song was simultaneously released in the United Kingdom in English. Two of her singles charted at number one in France: "Johnny, Johnny" and "En rouge et noir" in 1985 and 1986, respectively. Her 1980's albums are good examples of the Euro disco electro-pop style popular in Continental Europe at the time, featuring synthesizers and very catchy melodies. She had her days of glory in the Eighties, always dressed in black with tousled hair. At first she pleased a lot and then got on one's nerves a lot. Jeanne Mas didn't leave one indifferent and in her own way she marked an entire era.
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[edit] Biography
[edit] Formation and early years (1958-1983)
Jeanne Mas was born on February 28th, 1958 in Alicante, Spain. She started studying languages at the University of Nanterre (near Paris). After a Bachelors degree in Spanish and Italian, she took off for Italy in order to perfect the language she had just learned. She settled in Rome when she was only 19 years old. In Rome, she took dance classes and started landing small parts in commercials as well as in full-length films. This didn't seem to be her calling. A woman of action, she was not one of those women who could stand the waiting that this type of activity required. So she started a job as a television host on Italian television.
She also opened a crepe restaurant in Rome that did very well. At the same time, she started off in music and toured with a rock group which was rather hardcore. She recorded several 45's, one in English and the others in Italian. Then she met Romano Musumara who since then has become one of the most famous Italian composers of popular music. She would write her first hit with him.
[edit] First time (1984-1985)
Jeanne Mas decided to return to France with her demos in hand because the milieu of Italian popular music hardly suited her. She tried to sell her songs to several record companies before one of them accepted her. She in fact signed with Pathé-Marconi in 1984. In April, she made her first television appearance as a singer with the song "Toute première fois" It was an instant success: she sold about 900,000 copies of the single which was played on the radio all the way until December.
French people discovered a young woman on their TV screen entirely dressed in black, with jet-black hair, an emaciated face, and very pronounced make-up: a bland version of the punk look. Stimulating choreography with jerky gestures reinforced the image of a woman "who wants some action", almost aggressive. It is without a doubt this image that would seduce the young public. The press, the radio, the television and even the discos grabbed hold of this phenomenon.
At the beginning of the following year, she successively released a second single "Johnny, Johnny" followed by an album simply called Jeanne Mas. For this first go in the big leagues, she asked Daniel Balavoine for help. He produced two of the songs for the occasion.
Another single "Coeur en stéréo" was a hit in its own turn. In October, she played the Olympia club in Paris for the first time for four triumphant concerts. A few weeks later, she won the trophy for Revelation of the year and best female artist of the year during the first Victoires de la musique.
[edit] Triumphant Olympia (1986)
Made strong by this success, ravaging and full of energy, she locked herself in a studio in Denmark to record her next album. Heavily into her work, she already started writing her own lyrics. Jeanne Mas had a critical look on music and knew what she wanted. This is why she refused a song written by Musumara which would become "Comme un ouragan" interpreted by the gloss and glitter Princess Stephanie of Monaco. At the beginning of 1986, it took almost a week for Femmes d'aujourd'hui (the name of Jeanne's opus) to sell 100,000 copies, numbers that would in fact be multiplied by ten. The single from the album "En rouge et noir" quickly became a hit. In June, the album and the single were number one on the French charts. In the autumn, she played for seven days at the Palais des Sports in Paris and continued with forty concert dates in the rest of France.
[edit] Media failure (1987-1989)
This tour started up again in March 1987 for twenty dates, one of which was a concert in Lyon where a live record and a ninety-minute filmwere made. She then decided to take a break and take advantage of this time to return to Italy to have a baby, a little girl named Victoria.
1988 allowed her to look closely at her career, her artistic doubts. In September she got involved publicly for a subject that she held close to her heart, crimes against children. She wrote a letter to the French President. She suggested that he increase the sentences given to murderers. But detractors took her at her word and criticised her for wanting to reinstate the death penalty.
Despite this incident, Jeanne nevertheless didn't stay inactive and got back to work quickly with Piero Calabrese. She went into a studio for three months and chose the best musicians for the recording: Manu Katche on drums, Steve Shehan on (drums) percussions, Tony Levin on bass and David Rhodes on guitar. In February 1989 a new album titled Les crises de l'âme was released. The lyrics seemed more committed with songs like "J'accuse", "Tango" or still "Y'a des bons..." which denounced violence in the world. The latter song was in fact the first track on the album and Jeanne would make the video clip. In September, she played at Bercy for four nights that she wished would be unforgettable. Choreography, lights, nothing was forgotten. Unfortunately, the show didn't meet with the expected success and the tour that was scheduled to follow was cancelled.
[edit] When the decline begins (1990-1995)
Far from letting herself be beaten, the singer gathered her team to write a new album at the beginning of 1990. Recorded between Paris and Los Angeles, L'art des femmes came out in October. She re-did the beautiful "Tous les cris les S.O.S." by Balavoine. But her record company EMI invested a lot in the promotion of the first single, "Shakespeare", trying to straighten things up. But this had little effect. This album wouldn't reach 100,000 records sold. A year later, EMI put a compilation Depuis la toute première fois on the market.
In 1992, Jeanne Mas gave birth to a little boy named Christopher. Au nom des rois was the new album which came out on AB Productions in September, her collaboration with EMI having ended. The first track of the album was "Au nom des rois" of which the video clip was once again directed by the singer. Followed by "Dors bien Margot". In September 1993, she played three nights at Casino de Paris and followed with a thirty-five-date tour. Her fans were present but overall it seemed that the singer had lost some of her aura. Some mentioned a certain competition with Mylène Farmer who supposedly stole the spotlight from Jeanne. Jeanne didn't "believe" anymore. It was for this reason that she withdrew from public life for a while and settled in the South of France.
[edit] Rocker (1996-2002)
She came back in 1996 with a new album on Arcade records. Jeanne recorded Jeanne Mas & les Égoïstes in Toulouse which had 14 songs that she wrote herself, more like rock so as to return to her first love. Aware that she could disappoint the public, she still shows a new serenity on her face. Unfortunately the record went practically unnoticed.
After this comeback, Jeanne Mas, still interested in cinema, took some screenwriting courses in Paris. She even did a short film. All the same she wrote songs without being sure to want to make a record, her former experiences having taught her a lesson. It was the record company XIII Bis that enabled her to release a record in 2000. Désir d'insolence is therefore her seventh album. Among all of the songs, three have texts by the poets Paul Verlaine, Alfred de Vigny and Guillaume Appolinaire's "Le pont Mirabeau".
It is difficult for an artist to have known great success and fifteen years later to be a part of the incessant flood of record production without managing to go back to success. It is in fact the schema that Jeanne Mas has gone through despite herself, finally not knowing if music still represented a future.
[edit] Discography
[edit] Studio albums
- Jeanne Mas (1985)
- Femmes d'aujourd'hui (1986)
- Les crises de l'âme (1989)
- L'art des femmes (1990)
- Au nom des rois (1992)
- Jeanne Mas & les Égoïstes (1996)
- Désir d'insolence (2000)
- Je vous aime ainsi (2001)
- Les amants de Castille (2003)
- The Missing Flowers (2006)
[edit] Live albums
- En concert (1987)
[edit] Compilation albums
- Depuis la toute première fois (1991)
- Les plus grands succès de Jeanne Mas (1996)
- L'essentiel (2000)
- J'M - Le meilleur de Jeanne Mas (2001)
- Best of (2004)
- Most of the best (2007)
[edit] Singles
- 1978 : On The Moon
- 1984 : Toute première fois
- 1985 : Johnny, Johnny
- 1985 : Coeur en stéréo
- 1986 : En rouge et noir
- 1986 : L'enfant
- 1987 : Sauvez-moi
- 1987 : La bête libre
- 1989 : Y'a des bons...
- 1989 : J'accuse
- 1989 : Carolyne
- 1990 : Bébé rock
- 1990 : Shakespeare
- 1991 : Angela (L'art des femmes)
- 1992 : Au nom des rois
- 1992 : Dors bien Margot
- 1993 : Aime-moi
- 1994 : C'est pas normal
- 1996 : Côté H côté clean
- 1997 : Anna
- 2000 : Désir d'insolence
- 2001 : Je vous aime ainsi
- 2003 : Chimène
- 2003 : Poussière de Castille
- 2004 : Toute première fois (FDP Remix)
- 2005 : Johnny, Johnny (Remix)
- 2006 : Màs alli màs allà
- 2006 : On A Summer Day
- 2007 : Un air d'Argentine
- 2007 : C'est interdit
[edit] Filmography
- The Count of Monte-Cristo (1975)
- Porca società (1978)
- Caro papà (1979)
- Ricomincio da tre (1981)
- Il cavaliere, la morte e il diavolo (1985)
- Malone (TV episode Génération braqueurs) (2003)
- L'instit (TV episode Privé d'école) (2004)
