Benjamin Biolay has concocted a special “Christmas” program with Canal +. A great fan of Anglo-Saxon emissions of this type, the French artist explained how to fight the cockroach of this period.
The end-of-year celebrations are synonymous with joy for some and sadness for others. This is the case of the author-composer and performer Benjamin Biolay, who has designed a “special Christmas” television evening. No doubt to fight a “huge cockroach”, generally generated at this time for him.
“Winter is far from being the season that suits me the best”
With a host of guests at the Casino de Paris, Benjamin Biolay intends to bring to life the folklore that marked his childhood during the end-of-year celebrations. As he revealed to “Madame Figaro”, the author of “Rends l’amour” is not particularly in good shape in this period, which inspires him “A huge cockroach potential. Winter is far from being the season that works best for me. In order not to sink, I bet everything on folklore, I make boxes of it, with all the necessary decorum.” And for good reason, the maternal grandmother of the singer “the cement of the family” died on Christmas day, which marked him considerably.. It was only later that Benjamin Biolay ended up overcoming this spleen, which nevertheless leaves a mark in his unconscious “I realized that I needed to pull out the total package for Christmas to find a joyful flavor. Looking good, eating well, wanting to have fun, I like all that… And then the children have eyes that shine, it’s wonderful. I rediscovered the taste of Christmas and this need to sublimate this holiday as much as possible.”
In his childhood memory, the end-of-year celebrations coincided with the reruns of Sissi the Empress, “which are precisely part of folklore”, as well as the musical tale “Abracadabra” with Daniel Balavoine and Plastic Bertrand. These latter “covered the songs of the group ABBA translated into French, he remembers, it’s tart, but these are my Proust madeleines”. It must be said that Benjamin Biolay already has a little head start by playing the great Christmas jazz standards at home “I am very fond of the Christmas standards by Franck Sinatra, Dean Martin and Ella Fitzgerald which are on repeat at my house at the end of the yearhe explains, it’s swing, elegant, everything I love.” No wonder then that he is inspired by these classics to design his special evening “We have also integrated more contemporary titles, such as ‘Fairytale of New York’ by the Pogues or ‘All I want for Christmas is You’ by Mariah Carey, detailed Benjamin Biolay, we then created transition skits with my guests at the Casino de Paris”.
In line with the Anglo-Saxon tradition of end-of-year celebrations
This show was not born yesterday in the head of Benjamin Biolay. On the contrary, to read as he talks about it, we feel the carefully thought out project “It’s a great Anglo-Saxon tradition to celebrate the end of the year celebrations with television shows or special albums, he rewinds, the Beatles, for example, offered their fans Christmas discs every year, with titles and mini-sketches. There have also been Elvis Christmas albums, a Bill Murray special made by Sofia Coppola with George Clooney a few years ago, a Christmas single by hip-hop group Run DMC.” detailed Benjamin Biolay.
The show, which will be broadcast exclusively on Canal +, brings together the best artist friends of Benjamin Biolay, such as Kad Merad, or Calogero, surrounded and accompanied by a symphony orchestra in a magical setting. An excellent antidote to the blues that can, like the artist himself, weigh down the end of the year celebrations.