On May 3, it will be 35 years to the day that Dalida ended his life. In 1987, the artist was found dead at her home. She was 54 years old. If his disappearance upset more than one, some were not surprised. Dalida had been fighting for years against a chronic depression which ended up taking over her life. However, decades after having breathed her last, Dalida’s memory and talent continue to resonate in people’s minds. A long-term job that his brother Orlando got down to.
The producer was Anne-Elisabeth Lemoine’s guest in C to you on France 5 this Tuesday, April 12. On the occasion of the 35th anniversary of Dalida’s death, Orlando has worked on the reissue of a box dedicated to the artist with photos, unpublished texts and his greatest successes. Orlando took care of his sister’s career while she was alive and made her a promise the day he left that he intends to keep until his own death: “Yolanda [le vrai prénom de Dalida, ndlr], it’s my sister, it’s another bereavement. But the artist, I promised her she would never die. Dalida, all her life, set herself challenges and even the last one she won! She wanted to leave in full glory, in full beauty, she didn’t want time to do its work on her.“
For Orlando, it was therefore essential to maintain the memory of his sister by constantly continuing to talk about her and her songs. He also took the opportunity to reveal how Dalida had experienced a turning point in her life at the end of the 1960s after her first suicide attempt: “She was no longer the same. She spent her 4 winter years as she said. She wanted to know who she was, she needed another food. That’s why she bent over the books […] She needed that, she made 4 ashram trips. She no longer knew where she was, she even thought about stopping singing.“If the artist has passed away, thanks to her brother Orlando, her voice is still in full light.