Françoise Hardy

Françoise Madeleine Hardy became an international sensation during the early 1960s through her popular releases on Disques Vogue, the French jazz label that began showcasing chanson. Born in 1944 and raised in a single-parent household in the bustling Opera district of Paris, she had little contact with her father, though his gift of a guitar when she graduated high school aided her musical development. Charles Trenet and Cora Vaucaire were early influences, along with Elvis, Cliff Richard, The Everley Brothers, Paul Anka, Marty Wilde and Connie Francis, as heard on Radio Luxembourg. Answering a newspaper ad recruiting unknown singers while a freshman at the Sorbonne, Hardy signed to Disques Vogue in late 1961, scoring an instant success with single B-side, “Tous Les Garçons Et Les Filles”, which brought her to the forefront of the Yé-yé movement, melding chanson with Anglophone rock and pop. Mon Amie La Rose, her fourth album, was released in 1964; backed by the Charles Blackwell orchestra, it contains “Dans Le Mode Entier”, which became a huge chart hit in English as “All Over The World.”