With “Aimer”, presented as his “last album” in stores on Friday, Serge Lama, 79, said “goodbye” to his audience: “At an age, you have to know how to stop …”.
Singer Serge Lama poses in Paris on 21 September 2022
Singer Serge Lama poses in Paris on 21 September 2022
Serge Lama: “at an age, you have to know when to stop …” – Gallery
Singer Serge Lama poses in Paris on 21 September 2022
Singer Serge Lama poses in Paris on 21 September 2022
“I will continue to write songs, to record perhaps but secretly, in the will,” confides the artist met at his home by the AFP.
“You have to know how to say + it’s over +. I do it with this album. I don’t want to sing sitting like Reggiani … Even Aznavour should have stopped before”, underlines the interpreter of “P’tites femmes de Pigalle” and “D ‘ aventures en aventures “, hits among the many close sixty-year career.
“I have motor difficulties … At my age, as soon as I walk I suffer a lot,” confides the singer whose last tour was canceled by the pandemic. “She ripped my heart out. Now, I can’t last two hours on stage anymore.
For the farewell album, Serge Lama celebrates his reunion with arranger Jean-Claude Petit, with whom he shaped his first hits such as “I am sick” and “The singer is twenty years old” in 1973.
“With his immense arrangements, Jean-Claude was at the origin of my + starization +. Always with him, this latest album celebrates love in all directions. All the while, I sang of love which, with the sincerity I believe in, have been the watchwords of my career. If you are not sincere, the audience leaves you… ”, observes Serge Lama.
During the twelve tracks of this “definitive album” – the 24th of his career – the singer, alternately serious and playful, evokes in a duet both the love that unites him with his wife Luana and his admiration. unexpected for the tennis player Roger Federer or for the writer Albert Camus: “Oh Camus, I cry for you / You remain my hero / You who died of a Dostoevsky in the heart”.
“Federer me fascine!”
“Federer fascinates me! He is an incredible player, without the impression of effort… An admiration that is love at this point! ”, He admits about the Swiss that he has just retired. “I arrived late to my concerts because I saw his matches in my dressing room!”.
The retirement period inevitably inspires him with a poignant title: “I am a brave old man / In a hole in the suburbs / My life is not a party / Yet I am stubborn”. With the title “Handsome Mec”, he jokes: “You’re like a brand new penny / At the lottery bluff / You’re like a commodity / Who thinks it will last”.
Claiming the title of singer who performed the most concerts up to his 75th birthday “sometimes with 300 concerts a year”, Serge Lama says he gave everything for this latest album: “I put all my heart and all my soul … “.
Inspired lyricist and renowned composer, Serge Lama wrote his first texts before adolescence. Noticed by a singing teacher, he performed his first compositions in November 1963, opening the doors to Mireille’s Petit Conservatoire, a great television launch pad of the time. In February 1964, at the age of 21, he gave his first recital at L’Ecluse, the famous Parisian cabaret of the time, opening for Barbara.
If he were to give up the stage permanently, Serge Lama could accept a special program: “on television there are possible agreements with the devil. If a singer asks me to write songs for him, he will be happy. “Comedy also why not, but for a character sitting on the edge,” he laughs.
“I have no illusions: nothing will be remembered by me”, he adds. “We will not write a thesis on Serge Lama … From up there I would be surprised to see him!”.
AFP
