The Essay: Charles Aznavour in Five Songs

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Essays from leading writers on arts, history, philosophy, science, religion and beyond.

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The Essay: Charles Aznavour in Five Songs: 1: Emmenez-moi, by Muriel Zagha

1: Emmenez-moi, by Muriel Zagha

Charles Aznavour in Five Songs

BBC Radio 3 - The Essay, Charles Aznavour in Five Songs, 1: Emmenez-moi, by Muriel Zagha

The ouevre of Charles Aznavour in just five songs.1: Emmenez-moi, by Muriel Zagha.

The astonishing oeuvre of Charles Aznavour captured in five Essays on five songs. 1: Emmenez-Moi, by Muriel Zagha. A ballad of yearning to escape tempered by existential doubt.

Charles Aznavour contained multitudes. The quintessentially French outsider. The struggling bohemian and king of light entertainment who could fill the Albert Hall. His life and career explored across five Essays.

1: Emmenez-Moi by Muriel Zagha. This ballad of a working man's dream of escape, an escape that can never be truly free from the boundaries of self and one's own despair.

'What makes the song so powerful, so gripping? For one thing, anyone can relate to its sentiment. Who has never stood on a crowded tube train, staring out of the window at a travel advert showing white sand, blue waters, palm trees in the breeze – and wished to be transported there instantly?. The song buttonholes you, calls out to you, pleads with you: take me away with you, please. And at the same time, you feel what the docker feels – his entrapment in a dead-end life, his sense of monotony and alienation, his burning desire for escape and flight. '

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The astonishing oeuvre of Charles Aznavour, captured in five Essays on just five songs.

The astonishing oeuvre of Charles Aznavour - quintessentially French outsider, struggling bohemian and king of light entertainment - captured in five Essays on just five songs.

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1: Emmenez-moi, by Muriel Zagha

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