French crooner is Still a heart-throb at 75

Press, 27 November 1982, Page 10

French crooner is Still a heart-throb at 75

By

PAUL WEBSTER,

in Paris

Tino Rossi, at 75 the.most durable., of .all - french singers, is celebrating his fiftieth anniversary on the stage with a triumphal return to the Casino de, Paris that has perplexed his critics. Rossi has outlived and outsold every major French singer of his generation, survived or surmounted every upheaval in taste or politics, and. conquered ‘ generation after generation of female hearts with a style . once described as ‘marshmallow, marshmallow, nothing but marshmallow.’ His . new show, which opened recently, is booked out for two months. His bestselling record, “Petit Papa Noel” is still adding to its 30 million sales. ■ ' . Rossi, who has brushed aside, frequent advice to give up singing takes adoration in his stride. “I understand them,” he says, of the 100 per cent female audiences who idolise him. “It is a passion like, any other.” ’"A Fifty years ago Rossi gummed back his hair, wore frilly shirts and Gaucho boots, and brought France to a standstill with a Corsican lullaby called “NinniNanna.” His show business canonisation came when producerwriter Sacha ; Guitry described him as the “most illustrious Corsican except one,” after catching his act at the Casino de Paris in 1934. “O, Corse, L’lle D’Amour” and “Vieni, Vieni,” the songs he sang then, are still imprinted on French national consciousness without anyone

really being sure of the ’ Italian-inspired, general purpose tunes. Rossi, now round, businesssuited and graridfatherly, attributes his success ■’to a simple fact: “Thank God, 1 sing well.” He is basically a crooner with a Neapolitan touch who can drown out any /’pf his critics by quoting the? statistics of success. Unaffected by economic crisis or war. he has never sold less ; than 60.000 records a month since 1936, when he stopped France in its tracks ? with “O Catarinetta Bella, TchiTchi.” . ' Edith Piaf, whose own rise to stardom began during the war, recalled that when she sang in the streets she had to borrow Rossi’s repertoire to attract crowds. “It couldn’t fail,” she said. Now, if all the discs Rossi has ever sold were piled on top of each other, his publicity men estimate they would make a mountain three times higher than Everest, with Mont Blanc added on . top. ■;?; -.<■>’ . Each decade has brought further proof of his indestructability. “Petit Papa Noel,” a child’s prayer to Santa to keep warm, has dominated every French Christmas since .1946. Rossi outsold the rockers of the Sixties, pulled in bigger concert crowds than anyone else during the Seventies and is treated as an important public figure in the Eighties. President Francois Mitterrand, overlooking Rossi’s

past-links with the Right, made him a Commander of : the Legion of Honour, this year. But the Press still cannot come to terms with the man who has a boulevard named A after'him in Ajaccio and of : whom Maurice Chevalier said: “The correctness, the ingenuity, Thej; dignity . he spreads, along, . with the ■ natural manner with 'which

he accepts popular adoration, make' him a * special person.” £ A Left-wing critic, knocking his big show, said in anger: “How can any woman imagine having a tumble with this man and enjoying it?” . . .. Rossi’s disarming reply was: “All I know is that I please women and I earn money. Don’t forget to say that if 1 am giving this show it is to give pleasure to my public. They deserve it for their loyalty.”—Copyright Londrin “Observer” Service.