Esther Galil

Acclaimed French-Israeli singer-songwriter Esther Galil was born on May 28, 1945, in Safi, Morocco. The daughter of a Spanish Sephardic father and a Moroccan Jewish mother, she spent most of her childhood in Haifa, Israel, where she began singing at her local synagogue. After working as a cabaret singer in Tel Aviv, she returned to France and released a handful of singles under the name Jackie Galil. However, it was the hit "Le jour se lève" that helped her achieve widespread success, reaching the top of the French charts and becoming one of the best-selling singles of 1971. Over the next few years, Esther Galil performed alongside the likes of Michel Sardou, Johnny Hallyday, Mike Brant, and Gilbert Montagné, with whom she also starred in the 1972 film, Pour une pomme. Driven by the popularity of singles like "Delta Queen," "Harlem Song," or "Shalom dis-moi Shalom," her studio debut, Ma Liberté, appeared in 1974. Esther Galil would shy away from the spotlight shortly after the release of her sophomore effort, Z. Land, in 1976, only to reappear in 1988 with the track "Interdit par la loi" from the soundtrack of the film Deux minutes de soleil en plus. Subsequently, she relocated to Los Angeles, California, and mostly worked in film and advertising. In the following decades, she performed her breakout single "Le jour se lève" during the auditions for the second season of the French singing competition The Voice, la plus belle voix in 2013 and took part in the 2017 concert On a toujours 20 ans with other French pop luminaries such as Didier Barbelivien, Linda De Suza, and Jean-Jacques Debout.

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