Enrico Macias

Gaston Ghrenassia born 11 December 1938 known by his stage name Enrico Macias is a French singer songwriter and musician Gaston Ghrenassia was born to a Sephardic Jewish family His father Sylvain Ghrenassia 19142004 was a violinist in an orchestra that played primarily malouf Andalusian classical music Gaston played the guitar from childhood and started playing with the Cheikh Raymond Leyris Orchestra at age 15 He pursued a school teacher career but continued playing the guitar In 1961 the Algerian War of Independence was raging and the situation became untenable for the European colonizers of Constantine The assassination in 1961 of his fatherinlaw and musician Cheikh Raymond Leyris by the National Liberation Front FLN was of immense effect on Gaston Ghrenassia and appears to have been due to his opposition to the independence of Algeria from France and proIsrael stance Gaston left Algeria with his wife Suzy on 29 July 1961 eleven months before the end of the Algerian War of Independence and went into exile in mainland France He has not been permitted to return to Algeria ever since First living in Argenteuil he eventually moved to Paris where he decided to pursue a career in music At first he tried translating into French the malouf numbers which he already knew Later on he developed a new French repertoire that he performed in cafés and cabarets He remained though a popular interpreter of ArabAndalusian music and JudeoArab songs in France He adopted the stage name Enrico Macias and made his first recording in 1962 after a meeting with Raymond Bernard of Pathé The result was the recording of Adieu mon pays which he had composed for his beloved Algeria on the ship on his way to France He appeared on French television and became an overnight sensation This led to a first tour in 1963 as a second act with Paola and Billy Bridge His daughter Jocya was also born that year In spring 1964 he opened for Les Compagnons de la chanson at the Paris Olympia and then undertook a successful tour of the Middle East performing with great success in Israel Greece and Turkey especially in the latter where he still has a huge following In Turkey many of his songs were translated and interpreted by Turkish artists In 1965 he was awarded the Prix Vincent Scotto and the following year he sang before 120000 people at the Dinamo Stadium in Moscow performing concerts in more than 40 other Soviet cities He also toured Japan and recorded titles in Spanish and Italian and was popular in both countries His American debut at a soldout Carnegie Hall concert took place on 17 February 1968 He continued to tour the United States singing in Chicago Dallas and Los Angeles In Quebec Canada he was warmly welcomed as a Francophone artist Source Article Enrico Macias from Wikipedia in English licensed under CCBYSA