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After four previous albums that to varying degrees meld his idol Django Reinhardt's gypsy jazz with French chanson in originals and specially chosen covers, guitarist and vocalist Thomas Dutronc realizes a dream with Frenchy. Accompanied by his quartet and an international cast of guests including Iggy Pop, Diana Krall, Stacey Kent, Youn Sun Nah, Haley Reinhart, Jeff Goldblum, and Billy Gibbons, he pays homage to the timelessness of French song with a mostly wonderful result. Iggy and Krall assist on Hernri Bette's and Andre Hornez's "C'est si Bon," immortalized by Yves Montand. While this version doesn’t add much, it's delivered bilingually, thus embracing Jerry Seelen's English lyrics. Edit Piaf's theme, "La Vie en Rose," finds Gibbons adding a silvery touch to an uncharacteristically languid guitar solo. The particular quality in the grain of Dutronc's voice and phrasing bridge Piaf's clipped enunciation with Chet Baker's vulnerable delivery style. "Plus Je T'embrasse," penned by American composer Ben Ryan, was rendered iconic by Blossom Dearie in 1958. Dutronc reads it with fingerpopping hipster sass. American soprano saxophonist, jazz giant Sidney Bechet (beloved in France since 1922) scored a hit there with "Petit Fleur." Its Latin percussion and lonely musette frame Dutronc's vocal and guitar exquisitely. He also reimagines chart hits by two French groups who composed their lyrics in English: A sultry, almost erotic read of Air's "Playground Love" with South Korea's Nah, and an all but unrecognizable version of Daft Punk's international smash "Get Lucky." While Dutronc's vocal on the latter is unsuitable for its melody, his hip take on gypsy-cool jazz adds dimension and savvy. There's another fine duet here between the guitarist and Stacey Kent on a resonant, sensual take of Pierre Barouh's title theme for the film "Un Homme et Une Femme." Frenchy couldn’t exist without a tune by Reinhardt (the French press has dubbed Dutronc "Django's Son"), a modern version of "Minor Swing" that replaces Stephane Grappelli's violin with a Rhodes piano, popping electric guitars, and hyper-strummed mandolin. Alongside Haley Reinhart, Dutronc offers a resilient, rockist read of Jacques Brel's eternal "If You Go Away" adds to a lineage started by Georges Brassens and Leo Ferre. A truly confusing entry here is the inclusion of "My Way." Set to the music of the French song "Comme d'habitude," composed and written by Jacques Revaux, Frank Sinatra's signature version (with unrelated English lyrics by Paul Anka), is the standard no matter who sings it. Dutronc's attempt to straddle cultural lines is valiant, but so wispy it should have been abandoned. Further, on Sacha Distel's and Jean Broussolle's "La Belle Vie" (Yankees know it as Tony Bennet's "The Good Life"), is temporarily elevated by Goldblum's deft pianism, but his uneven, ever so slight singing voice, when paired with the guitarist's expressive baritone, proves detrimental. Dutronc planned and recorded Frenchy with great care and more than a little skill. Fans will find much to delight in. However, attraction for non-Francophone audiences may prove -- despite the album's high quality -- somewhat limited.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

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Released nine years after their split, Flammes is a greatest-hits package from the electronic pop duo described as France's answer to the Eurythmics, Niagara. The 2002 18-track collection features material from their four studio albums, including 1985 debut single "Tchiki Boum," European hits "Pendant Que Les Champs Brulent" and "J'ai Vu," and their swan song, "Le Minotaure."© Jon O'Brien /TiVo

After four previous albums that to varying degrees meld his idol Django Reinhardt's gypsy jazz with French chanson in originals and specially chosen covers, guitarist and vocalist Thomas Dutronc realizes a dream with Frenchy. Accompanied by his quartet and an international cast of guests including Iggy Pop, Diana Krall, Stacey Kent, Youn Sun Nah, Haley Reinhart, Jeff Goldblum, and Billy Gibbons, he pays homage to the timelessness of French song with a mostly wonderful result. Iggy and Krall assist on Hernri Bette's and Andre Hornez's "C'est si Bon," immortalized by Yves Montand. While this version doesn’t add much, it's delivered bilingually, thus embracing Jerry Seelen's English lyrics. Edit Piaf's theme, "La Vie en Rose," finds Gibbons adding a silvery touch to an uncharacteristically languid guitar solo. The particular quality in the grain of Dutronc's voice and phrasing bridge Piaf's clipped enunciation with Chet Baker's vulnerable delivery style. "Plus Je T'embrasse," penned by American composer Ben Ryan, was rendered iconic by Blossom Dearie in 1958. Dutronc reads it with fingerpopping hipster sass. American soprano saxophonist, jazz giant Sidney Bechet (beloved in France since 1922) scored a hit there with "Petit Fleur." Its Latin percussion and lonely musette frame Dutronc's vocal and guitar exquisitely. He also reimagines chart hits by two French groups who composed their lyrics in English: A sultry, almost erotic read of Air's "Playground Love" with South Korea's Nah, and an all but unrecognizable version of Daft Punk's international smash "Get Lucky." While Dutronc's vocal on the latter is unsuitable for its melody, his hip take on gypsy-cool jazz adds dimension and savvy. There's another fine duet here between the guitarist and Stacey Kent on a resonant, sensual take of Pierre Barouh's title theme for the film "Un Homme et Une Femme." Frenchy couldn’t exist without a tune by Reinhardt (the French press has dubbed Dutronc "Django's Son"), a modern version of "Minor Swing" that replaces Stephane Grappelli's violin with a Rhodes piano, popping electric guitars, and hyper-strummed mandolin. Alongside Haley Reinhart, Dutronc offers a resilient, rockist read of Jacques Brel's eternal "If You Go Away" adds to a lineage started by Georges Brassens and Leo Ferre. A truly confusing entry here is the inclusion of "My Way." Set to the music of the French song "Comme d'habitude," composed and written by Jacques Revaux, Frank Sinatra's signature version (with unrelated English lyrics by Paul Anka), is the standard no matter who sings it. Dutronc's attempt to straddle cultural lines is valiant, but so wispy it should have been abandoned. Further, on Sacha Distel's and Jean Broussolle's "La Belle Vie" (Yankees know it as Tony Bennet's "The Good Life"), is temporarily elevated by Goldblum's deft pianism, but his uneven, ever so slight singing voice, when paired with the guitarist's expressive baritone, proves detrimental. Dutronc planned and recorded Frenchy with great care and more than a little skill. Fans will find much to delight in. However, attraction for non-Francophone audiences may prove -- despite the album's high quality -- somewhat limited.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

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The initial fame Christophe Maé garnered in 2005-2006 as an actor in the musical Le Roi Soleil, where he played Philippe, the brother of Louis XIV, was trumped by his subsequent venture into the French pop scene as a folk-pop singer/songwriter/guitarist. Though not technically his full-length solo debut album (that would be a more or less impossible to find independently released album called Sa Danse Donne), Mon Paradis was the first of his albums heard on a mass scale, and it proved tremendously popular, becoming the second best-selling French album of 2007 and spawning a series of hit singles, including the chart-topping lead single, "On S'Attache." Maé is graced with a uniquely signature singing voice and an easygoing lilt in common with one of his most often cited influences, Bob Marley. These two characteristics above all others define Mon Paradis and are showcased best on "On S'Attache," the aforementioned album opener. Thankfully, the material that follows (co-written by Maé with the help of Michel Domisseck, Lionel Florence, Bruno Dandrimont, Jeff Oricelli, Olivier Schulteis, Pascal Obispo, and Jacquot) is uniformly excellent, especially the first quarter of the album, including "Mon Paradis," "Belle Demoiselle," and "Parce Qu'on Sait Jamais" as well as "On S'Attache." Sequenced midway through the album is another highlight, "C'est Ma Terre," a perfectly crafted pop song that opens with a little beatboxing before unfolding with backing vocals and a singalong chorus. Though four different writers are credited with penning "C'est Ma Terre," it doesn't sound overwrought. If anything, it sounds fine-tuned, as if Maé wrote the song himself and then sought input from a few of his hired hands, incorporating the finishing touches until he had a polished gem. Most of the latter half of Mon Paradis is credited solely to Maé, and while it's true these songs aren't as captivating as the earlier sequenced hit singles, the self-penned songs that fill much of the latter half of the album are impressive nonetheless. So while there's no doubt Maé is a capable songwriter, not only is he willing to collaborate with hired hands; it seems as if he benefits from the outside input. The production touches of Volodia benefit Maé as well. An industry veteran with a long track record of success, Volodia gives the stripped-down folk-pop of Maé a thoroughly modern sheen, adding little touches (e.g., the opening beatbox of "C'est Ma Terre," the hand percussion of "Spleen," lots of multi-tracked vocals) so that each song of Mon Paradis sounds unique and dynamic. Indeed, Maé is the rare folk-pop singer/songwriter/guitarist who can crash the gates and obtain commercial success internationally in the iPod age without forsaking any of his craftsmanship. It helps, of course, that Maé was able to build upon the initial fame he garnered in Le Roi Soleil, but there's no question Mon Paradis is the work of a talented young man who works well with others.© Jason Birchmeier /TiVo

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Composed by Stravinsky in 1933 in the wake of the French oratorio fashion whose figureheads are Milhaud (Les Choéphores) and Honegger (Le Roi David, Jeanne d’Arc au bûcher), and his own Oedipus Rex, Perséphone sanctifies the French period of the Russian composer, after he left Switzerland and before he settled definitely in the United States. Ordered by Ida Rubinstein, to whom music history already owed Debussy’s Martyre de Saint-Sébastien and Ravel’s Boléro, this melodrama, profane in its story and hybrid regarding its musical form, glorifies spring -without it being a new “Consecration” in its language) on a text by André Gide, thus prolonging the emotion created by the novel Si le grain ne meurt. The three acts of the work (Perséphone enlevée, Perséphone aux enfers, Perséphone renaissante) are close to human nature and psyche with an empathy reinforced by Stravinsky’s music. Conceived for a tenor (Eumolpe), a narrator, a mixed chorus, a chidren’s chorus and an orchestra, this work, so original in the production of its author, has however never found its audience. People long blamed Stravinsky for wringing the neck of the prosody of Gide’s text without understanding that it was however one of its more sensitive works, possessed with a melodic verve, a clear lyricism and a warmth for which he wasn’t known for. Under Esa-Pekka Salonen’s inspired and aerial baton, Perséphone finds here a second youth which might finally allow it to impose itself to a new generation of music lovers. This “strange profane mass” (as described by Marcel Marnat) is probably one of the most touching works of a composer that is always looking for new springs. © François Hudry/Qobuz

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