Women I will try to express my inner feelings and thankfulness for showing me the meaning of success. – Woman, John Lennon
And on this International Women’s Day a celebration of international women in the places they celebrated.
La Vie en Paris
Edith Piaf, Paris: A solemn fan stands in contemplation at the grave of La Chanteuse in Pere Lachaise.
And gives out to the family trying to negotiate their way through the myriad streets of the huge graveyard in Paris.
Before Le Custode rang the bell on us, in our ears.
Moi? Je ne regrette rien.
La Vie en L’Ecosse
Eddi Reader, Scotland: My own wee country has produced many memorable Scottish singers and singers of Scottish songs.
But I’m picking out Eddi Reader, once of Fairground Attraction, for making Robert Burns and Old Scotland hip again.
With songs such as Jamie Come Try Me and Comin’ Through The Rye.
Scottish Warriors
Eddi learned her craft in Paris where she channeled her own Edith and then brought that vibe over to old Scots.
Old Scots translates too to our brethren and sistren in Ireland.
Where she owned the audience in my adopted town in Greystones, Co. Wicklow, and Dublin.
La Vie en New Jersey
Debbie Harry, New Jersey: Was there anyone racier for an adolescent schoolboy in the late 70s than Debbie Harry?
And when she sings in French on Sunday Girl… incrèdible!
Debbie made even the starkest landscape sing and who can forget the video of her flirting with the camera in the Union City. boatyard?
La Vie en New Orleans et Orlando
Voulez-vous coucher avec mou c’est soir?
Not an invitation, though it was to the thousand or so in Orlando’s Rising Star Karaoke Club in CityWalk, Universal Orlando.
I channeled my own Lady Marmalade there and while you’d be forgiven for knowing it wasn’t French New Orleans.
The compere was gracious enough to tell the audience that that was the way to deliver a girls’ song.
ICI, AUX FEMMES
1 thought on “Rainy Days and Songdays – International Women”