Michel Legrand

Michel Legrand (24 February 1932 – 26 January 2019) was a French musical composer, arranger, conductor, and jazz pianist. 

Legrand was a prolific composer, he wrote over 200 film and television scores, in addition to many memorable songs. He is best known for his often haunting, jazz-tinged film music. His celebrated scores for the films of French New Wave director Jacques Demy, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg(1964) and The Young Girls of Rochefort (1967), earned Legrand his first Academy Award nominations. Legrand won his first Oscar for the song "The Windmills of Your Mind" from The Thomas Crown Affair (1968).

Contents

Early life

Legrand was born in the Paris district of Ménilmontant. His father, Raymond Legrand, was a conductor and composer renowned for hits such as Irma la douce and his mother was Marcelle Ter-Mikaëlian (sister of conductor Jacques Hélian); they had married in 1929. His maternal grandfather was of Armenian descent and was considered a member of the bourgeoisie.

Career

Legrand composed more than two hundred film and television scores and several musicals and recorded over a hundred albums. He won three Oscars (out of 13 nominations) and five Grammys and was nominated for an Emmy. He was 22 when his first album, I Love Paris, became one of the best-selling instrumental albums ever released. He was a virtuoso jazz and classical pianist and an accomplished arranger and conductor who performs with orchestras all over the world.

He studied music at the Paris Conservatoire from 1943 to 1950 (ages 11–18), working with, among others, Nadia Boulanger, who also taught many other composers, including Aaron Copland, Philip Glass, and Ástor Piazzolla. Legrand graduated with top honors as both a composer and a pianist.

Jazz recordings

Legrand has also contributed significant work in jazz. While on a visit to the U.S. in 1958, Legrand collaborated with such musicians as Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Phil Woods, Ben Webster, Hank Jones, and Art Farmer in an album of inventive orchestrations of jazz standards titled Legrand Jazz. The following year, back in Paris with bassist Guy Pedersen and percussionist Gus Wallez, he recorded an album of Paris-themed songs arranged for jazz piano trio, titled Paris Jazz Piano. Nearly a decade later he recorded At Shelly's Manne-Hole (1968), a live trio session with bassist Ray Brown and drummer Shelly Manne, in which four of the compositions were improvised on the spot. Legrand also provided an odd scat vocal on "My Funny Valentine". Legrand returned to his role as jazz arranger for the Stan Getz album Communications '72 (recorded in December 1971) and resumed his collaboration with Phil Woods on Le Jazz Grand (1978) and After the Rain (1982); then, he collaborated with violinist Stephane Grappelli on an album in 1992. Not as well received as his earlier work in the field of jazz was a 1994 album for LaserLight entitled Michel Plays Legrand. Later, in 2002, he recorded a solo jazz piano album reworking 14 of his classic songs, Michel Legrand by Michel Legrand. His jazz piano style is virtuosic and eclectic, drawing upon such influences as Art Tatum, Erroll Garner, Oscar Peterson, and Bill Evans.

In 1966, he made the arrangements of the international song "C'est si bon" by Henri Betti and André Hornezfor the Barbra Streisand album Color Me Barbra. In 1948, his father Raymond Legrand had conducted the orchestra for the recording of this song by Les Soeurs Étienne.

A number of his songs, including "What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?", "Watch What Happens", "The Summer Knows", and "You Must Believe in Spring", have become jazz standards covered frequently by other artists.

Eclecticism

During various periods of creative work, Legrand became a conductor for orchestras in St. Petersburg, Florida, Vancouver, Montreal, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, and Denver. He recorded more than one hundred albums with international musical stars (spanning the genres of jazz, variety, and classical) and worked with such diverse musicians as Jacques Brel, Phil Woods, Ray Charles, Claude Nougaro, Perry Como, Neil Diamond, Ella Fitzgerald, Aretha Franklin, Lena Horne, James Ingram, Jack Jones, Kiri te Kanawa, Tamara Gverdciteli, Frankie Laine, Tereza Kesovija, Johnny Mathis, Jessye Norman, Diana Ross, Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Sarah Vaughan, Shirley Bassey, Andy Williams, Regine Velasquez, Nana Mouskouri, Elis Regina, Natalie Dessay and Kuh Ledesma. He discovered Chicago teenage singer/songwriter Laury Shelley at the legendary club Mister Kelly's and she became his concert vocalist from 1975-1981. They performed all over North America including Carnegie Hall, Red Rocks Amphitheatre, The Westbury and The Forum in Montreal. Their performance at New York's Maisonette Room at the St. Regis Hotel is immortalized on the recording Michel Legrand and Friends. Laury Shelley and Michel reunited in 2011 in four performances at The Dakota Jazz Club, in Minneapolis.

Legrand has also recorded classical piano pieces by Erik Satie and American composers such as Amy Beach, George Gershwin, Aaron Copland, John Cage, and Conlon Nancarrow. He is a prolific recorder of jazz, popular and classical music albums, having released over one hundred.

His sister, Christiane Legrand, was a member of the Swingle Singers, and his niece Victoria Legrand is a member of the indie rock duo Beach House.

Film scores

Legrand is known principally as a composer of innovative music for films, composing film scores (about two hundred to date) for directors Jean-Luc Godard, Richard Brooks, Claude Lelouch, Clint Eastwood, Barbra Streisand, Robert Altman, Joseph Losey, and many others. Legrand himself appears and performs in Agnès Varda's Cleo from 5 to 7 (1961). After his songs appeared in Jacques Demy's films The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) and The Young Girls of Rochefort (1966), Legrand became known internationally. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg was a sung-through musical in which all the dialogue was set to music, an unusual concept at the time.

Hollywood soon became interested in Legrand after The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, bombarding him with requests to compose music for films. Having begun to collaborate with Hollywood, Legrand continued to work there for many years. Among his best-known scores are those for The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), which features the hit song "The Windmills of Your Mind", The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun(1970), The Go-Between and Summer of '42 (1971), the last of which features another hit song, "The Summer Knows". Legrand also wrote the score for Orson Welles's last-completed film, F for Fake (1974) and would later compose the score for Welles's posthumously-released movie The Other Side of the Wind(2018). He also composed the score for Yentl (1983), as well as the film score for Louis Malle's film Atlantic City (1980).

Music charts

Legrand's instrumental version of the theme from Brian's Song charted for eight weeks in 1972, peaking at No. 56 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Death

Legrand died in Paris on 26 January 2019 at the age of 86. He remained active until his death and had concerts scheduled to take place in the spring.

Selected discography

Albums

• 1954 I Love Paris
• 1955 Holiday in Rome
• 1956 Castles in Spain
• 1957 Bonjour Paris
• 1957 C'est magnifique
• 1958 Legrand in Rio
• 1958 The Columbia Album of Cole Porter
• 1959 Paris Jazz Piano
• 1959 The New I Love Paris
• 1959 Legrand Jazz
• 1962 Strings On Fire (Philips Records)
• 1963 Michel Legrand Big Band Plays Richard Rodgers (Philips Records)
• 1964 Archi-Cordes
• 1964 Plays for Dancers (US release of Archi-Cordes)
• 1967 Violent Violins (UK release of Archi-Cordes)
• 1967 Cinema Legrand (MGM Records)
• 1968 At Shelly's Manne-Hole
• 1974 Twenty Songs of the Century
• 1980 Atlantic City
• 1983 After the Rain
• 1995 Michel Legrand Big Band
• 2013 Entre elle et lui (with Natalie Dessay)

With Stan Getz

• Communications '72 (Verve, 1972)

With Bud Shank

• Windmills of Your Mind (Pacific Jazz, 1969)

With Sarah Vaughan

• Sarah Vaughan with Michel Legrand (Atlantic, 1972)

Filmography

• Lovers Net (Les amants du Tage) (1954)
• Continente perduto (orchestrated) (1955)
• Charmants garçons (1958)
• Le Triporteur (1958)
• L'Amérique insolite (1958)
• L'Americain se détend (1958)
• Terrain vague (co-composer) (1960)
• A Woman Is a Woman (Une femme est une femme) (1960)
• The French Game (Le cœur battant) (1960)
• Les Portes claquent (1960)
• Lola (1961)
• Cléo from 5 to 7 (Cléo de 5 à 7) (1961)
• The Seven Deadly Sins (Les Sept péchés capitaux) (co-composer) (1961)
• The Winner (Un cœur gros comme ça) (1961)
• Retour a New York (1962)
• Comme un poisson dans l'eau (1962)
• Eva (1962)
• Une grosse tete (1962)
• My Life to Live (Vivre sa Vie: Film en Douze Tableaux) (1962)
• Bay of Angels (La baie des anges) (1962)
• L'Amerique lunaire (1962)
• Histoire d'un petit garcon devenu grand (1962)
• Le Joli Mai (1962)
• Illuminations (1963)
• Le grand escroc (1963)
• L'Empire de la nuit (1963)
• Love Is a Ball (1963)
• The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg) (1964)
• A Ravishing Idiot (Une ravissante idiote) (1964)
• Band of Outsiders (Bande à part) (1964)
• Fascinante amazonie (1964)
• Les amoureux du France (1964)
• La Douceur du village (1964)
• A Matter of Resistance (La vie de château) (1965)
• Quand passent les faisans (1965)
• Tender Scoundrel [fr] (Tendre voyou) (1965)
• Monnaie de singe (1965)
• The Young Girls of Rochefort (Les Demoiselles de Rochefort) (1966)
• Who Are You, Polly Magoo? (Qui êtes-vous, Polly Maggoo?) (1966)
• The Plastic Dome of Norma Jean (1966)
• L'an 2000 (1966)
• Gold and Lead (L'or et le plomb) (1966)
• A Matter of Innocence (also known as Pretty Polly) (1967)
• L'homme à la Buick (1967)
• How to Save a Marriage and Ruin Your Life (1967)
• Sweet November (1968)
• The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)
• Play Dirty (1968)
• The Appointment (rejected) (1968)
• Ice Station Zebra (1968)
• Michel's Mixed Up Musical Bird (1968)
• The Swimming Pool (La Piscine) (1968)
• Castle Keep (1969)
• The Happy Ending (1969)
• The Picasso Summer (1969)
• Pieces of Dreams (1969)
• The Magic Garden of Stanley Sweetheart (1970)
• Wuthering Heights (1970)
• Donkey Skin (Peau d'Âne) (1970)
• The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun (La Dame dans l'auto avec des lunettes et un fusil) (1970)
• The Go-Between (1971)
• The Married Couple of the Year Two (Les mariés de l'an II) (1971)
• Summer of '42 (1971)
• Le Mans (1971)
• Touch and Go [fr] (La Poudre d'escampette) (1971)
• A Few Hours of Sunlight (Un peu de soleil dans l'eau froide) (1971)
• A Time for Loving (Also: Paris Was Made for Lovers) (1972)
• La vieille Fille (The Old Maid) (1972)
• Lady Sings the Blues (1972)
• Portnoy's Complaint (1972)
• Hearth Fires (Les feux de la Chandeleur) (1972)
• One Is a Lonely Number (1972)
• The Outside Man (Un homme est mort) (1972)
• A Doll's House (1973)
• The Nelson Affair (Also: Bequest to the Nation) (1973)
• Story of a Love Story (1973)
• The Hostages (Le gang des otages) (1973)
• 40 Carats (1973)
• Cops and Robbers (1973)
• Breezy (1973)
• The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing (rejected) (1973)
• The Three Musketeers (1973)
• A Slightly Pregnant Man (L'Evenement le plus important depuis que l'homme marche sur la lune) (1973)
• Our Time (1974)
• F for Fake (1974)
• Section spéciale (Special Section) (1975)
• The Savage (Le Sauvage) (1975)
• Sheila Levine Is Dead and Living in New York (1975)
• Gable and Lombard (1976)
• Ode to Billy Joe (1976)
• Le voyage de noces (1976)
• The Smurfs and the Magic Flute (La flute a six schtroumpfs) (1976)
• Gulliver's Travels (1977)
• The Other Side of Midnight (1977)
• Routes to the South (Les routes du sud) (1978)
• Mon premier amour (1978)
• The Phoenix (1978)
• Lady Oscar (1979)
• Je Vous Ferai Aimer La Vie (1979)
• The Fabulous Adventures of The Legendare Baron Munchhausen (Les fabuleuses aventures du légendaire Baron de Munchausen) (1979)
• Atlantic City (1980)
• The Hunter (1980)
• The Mountain Men (1980)
• Les Uns et les Autres (also known as Bolero) (1980)
• Hinotori (co-composer) (1980)
• Falling in Love Again (1980)
• What Makes David Run? (Qu'est-ce qui fait courir David?) (1981)
• Le Cadeau (1981)
• Chu Chu and the Philly Flash (1981)
• Your Ticket Is No Longer Valid (1982)
• Slapstick of Another Kind (1982) (1982 cut)
• La revanche des humanoides (1982)
• Best Friends (1982)
• The Gift (1982)
• Yentl (1983)
• Never Say Never Again (1983)
• A Love in Germany (Un amour en Allemagne) (1983)
• Secret Places (1984)
• Love Songs (Paroles et musique) (1984)
• Palace (1985)
• Partir, revenir (1985)
• Train to Hell (Train d'enfer) (1985)
• Parking (1985)
• Crossings (1986)
• Sins (1986)
• Casanova (1987)
• Social Club (Club de rencontres) (1987)
• Spirale (1987)
• Switching Channels (1988)
• Three Seats for the 26th (Trois places pour le 26) (1988)
• Five Days in June (Cinq jours en juin) (1989)
• Escape from Paradise (Fuga dal Paradiso) (1990)
• Dingo with Miles Davis (1991)
• Gaspard et Robinson (1991)
• The Burning Shore (1991)
• The Pickle (1993)
• Ready to Wear (Prêt-à-Porter) (1994)
• Angels in the Outfield (1994)
• Les Misérables (1995)
• Les Enfants de Lumière (1995)
• Aaron's Magic Village (1997)
• Madeline (1998)
• Doggy Bag (1999)
• Season's Beatings (La Bûche) (1999)
• The Blue Bicycle (La Bicyclette Bleue) (2000)
• And Now... Ladies and Gentlemen (2002)
• Cavalcade (2005)
• Disco (2008)
• Oscar and the Lady In Pink (Oscar Et Le Dame En Rose) (2009)
• La rançon de la gloire (2014)
• The Guardians (2017)
• The Other Side of the Wind (2018)
• J'ai perdu Albert (2018)

Computer games

• Torin's Passage (1994)

Television

• with Coloratura Soprano Dame Julie Andrews Music Around the World (1969)
• Brian's Song (1971)
• Oum le Dauphin Blanc (1971)
• The Adventures of Don Quixote (1973)
• It's Good To Be Alive (1974)
• Cage Without a Key (1975)
• Michel's Mixed-Up Musical Bird (1977; an ABC Afterschool Special)
• Once Upon a Time... Space (1981)
• A Woman Named Golda (1982)
• The Jesse Owens Story (1984)
• Promises to Keep (1985)
• As Summers Die (1986)
• Once Upon a Time... Life (1986)
• Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less (1990)
• La Montagna dei Diamanti (1991)
• Once Upon a Time... The Americas (1991)
• Once Upon a Time... The Discoverers (1994)
• The Ring (1995)
• Once Upon a Time... The Explorers (1997)
• Songbird Sings Legrand (A Concert with Regine Velasquez) (2002)
• Once Upon a Time... The Planet Earth (2008)

Musical theatre

Legrand composed the score for the musical Amour, which premiered in 2002 on Broadway and was translated into English by Jeremy Sams and was directed by James Lapine.[12] This musical was his Broadway debut, and while it ran for only 17 performances and 31 previews, it garnered a loyal fan base due to its much-praised cast album on Ghostlight Records, and subsequent multiple Tony Award nominations (2003), including Best Score for Michel Legrand and Best Actress for its leading actress Melissa Errico.

Legrand continued his collaboration with Errico to the present day, appearing at such jazz venues as Dizzy's at Lincoln Center. Though he has rarely done this for any solo artist, Michel Legrand arranged, conducted and accompanied Errico with a 100-piece symphony on her CD Legrand Affair (released in October 2011 on Ghostlight Records) featuring his songs, hidden French gems, as well as one new song with lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman. The CD was produced by Phil Ramone and is featured in Ramone's 2007 book Making Records: The Scenes Behind the Music.

The world premiere of the new musical Marguerite from Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg, the creators of Les Misérables and Miss Saigon, included music by Michel Legrand and lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer. Marguerite is set during World War II in occupied Paris, and was inspired by the romantic novel La Dame aux camélias by Alexandre Dumas, fils. It premiered in May 2008 at the Haymarket Theatre, London and was directed by Jonathan Kent.

Awards

Legrand has won three Oscars (out of 13 nominations), five Grammys, and has been nominated for an Emmy. The following are some of the awards and nominations with which Legrand's works have been honored:

Academy Award nominations

• Best Original Score, Substantially Original Score: The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1965)
• Best Original Score for a Motion Picture (not a Musical): The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)
• Best Original Song Score and Its Adaptation or Best Adaptation Score: The Young Girls of Rochefort(1968)
• Best Original Dramatic Score: Summer of '42 (1971) (won)
• Best Original Song Score and Its Adaptation or Best Adaptation Score: Yentl (1983) (won)
• Best Original Song:
  • "I Will Wait for You" from The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1965)
  • "The Windmills of Your Mind" (won) from The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)
  • "What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?" from The Happy Ending (1969)
  • "Pieces of Dreams" from Pieces of Dreams (1970)
  • "How Do You Keep the Music Playing?" from Best Friends (1982)
  • "Papa, Can You Hear Me?" and "The Way He Makes Me Feel" both from Yentl (1983)

Golden Globe nominations

• Original Score:
  • The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)
  • The Happy Ending (1969)
  • Wuthering Heights (1970)
  • Le Mans (1971)
  • Summer of '42 (1971)
  • Lady Sings the Blues (1972)
  • Breezy (1973)
  • Yentl (1983)
• Original Song:
  • "The Windmills of Your Mind" from The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) (won)
  • "What are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?" from The Happy Ending (1969)
  • "Pieces of Dreams" from Pieces of Dreams (1970)
  • "Breezy's Song" from Breezy (1973)
  • "Yesterday's Dreams" from Falling in love again (1980)
  • "The Way He Makes Me Feel" from Yentl (1983)

Grammy Award nominations

• Best arrangement accompanying vocalist: What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life? (Sarah Vaughan) (1972)
• Song of the year: "The Summer Knows" from Summer of '42 (1972)
• Best instrumental composition: "Brian's Song" [TV] (1972)
• Best original score written for a motion picture or television special: The Three Musketeers (1974)
• Best instrumental composition: "Images" (1982)
• Best jazz performance by a Big Band: "Images" (1982) (won)
• Best original score album: Yentl (1983)
• Best instrumental arrangement accompanying vocals: Yentl (Barbra Streisand) (1983)

Theatre nominations

• Tony Award for Best Original Score: Amour (2002)
• Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Original Score: Amour (2002)

Emmy Award nominations

• Outstanding Achievement in Music Composition for a Limited Series or a Special (Dramatic Underscore): A Woman Called Golda [TV] (1982)

Fennecus nominations

• Song score, original or adaptation: Yentl (1983)
• Original song: "The Way He Makes Me Feel" from Yentl (1983)

Apex nominations

• Original score, comedy: Best Friends (1982)
• Original song, drama: "The Way He Makes Me Feel" from Yentl (1983)
• Original song score/adaptation/compilation, drama: Yentl (1983)

Australian Film Institute Award nominations

• Best Original Music Score: Dingo (1991)

Prix Moliere Award

• Best musical: Le Passe-Muraille

ASCAP

• Henry Mancini Award for Le Passe-Muraille

Golden Eagle Award

• Outstanding contribution to world cinema (2002)

Others

• In 2018, asteroid 31201 Michellegrand was named in his honor