Henri Salvador

Henri Salvador 18 July 1917 13 February 2008 was a French Caribbean comedian singer and cabaret artist Salvador was born in Cayenne French Guiana His father Clovis and his mother Antonine Paterne daughter of a native Carib Indian were both from Guadeloupe French West Indies Salvador had a brother André and a sister Alice He began his musical career as a guitarist accompanying other singers He had learned the guitar by imitating Django Reinhardts recordings and was to work alongside him in the 1940s Salvador recorded several songs written by Boris Vian with Quincy Jones as arranger He played many years with Ray Ventura and His Collegians where he used to sing dance and even play comedy on stage He also appeared in movies including Nous irons à MonteCarlo 1950 Nous irons à Paris Jean Boyers film of 1949 with the Peters Sisters and Mademoiselle samuse 1948 He is known to have recorded the first French rock and roll songs in 1957 written by Boris Vian and Michel Legrand Rockn Roll Mops Rock hoquet Va tfaire cuire un oeuf man and Dismoi qutu maimes rock under the artist name of Henry Cording a play on the word Recording Despite this historical aspect he never ceased to claim that he disliked rock and roll and even refused to talk about this subject later on In the 1960s Salvador was the host of several popular television variety shows on French TV In 1964 he scored a hit with Zorro est arrivé which was adapted from The Coasters US hit Along Came Jones He is also famous for his rich catchy laugh which is a theme in many of his humorous songs In 1969 Henri Salvador recorded a variation of Mah Nà Mah Nà entitled Mais non mais non But No But No or Of Course Not Of Course Not with lyrics he had written in French to Piero Umilianis music Henri Salvador and his song Dans mon île 1957 were thought to be an influence on Antônio Carlos Jobim in formulating the Brazilian bossa nova style Famous Brazilian composer and singer Caetano Veloso made Henri Salvador famous to Brazilian audiences with the song Reconvexo in which he says quem não sentiu o swing de Henri Salvador who hasnt felt the swing of Henri Salvador Veloso also recorded a version of Salvadors song Dans mon île At the age of 70 Salvador was the voiceover of the crab Sebastian in the 1989 French dubbing of Disneys The Little Mermaid Recordings of Embrassela Kiss the Girl can be found on YouTube Salvador discovered singers Keren Ann and Art Mengo He died of a ruptured aneurysm at his home in the early hours of 13 February 2008 He was 90 years of age He was buried next to his wife Jacqueline in PèreLachaise Cemetery He was known as a supporter of Paris SaintGermain FC He obtained four seats for life in the Parc des Princes Source Article Henri Salvador from Wikipedia in English licensed under CCBYSA 30