From Moulin Rouge to Broadway: The Denise Le Brun Story
It’s a year now since French chanteuse Denise Le Brun took her final curtain and joined her friends, Edith Piaf, Jacques Brel and Marcel Marceau in Showbiz Heaven.
A familiar figure in Amboise, people smiled when they saw her very lively, very energetic, very impatient dog taking Denise for a walk. They could never have guessed that her name caused standing ovations in New York theatres before she even appeared on stage.
How wonderful that her mother travelled from Paris to share her fame. How wonderful to see her daughter fulfil her destiny.
Did it ever occur to Denise that those she left behind would miss her as much as we do? Did she realise how much we were in awe of her? How we admired her? How privileged we felt and still feel to call her a friend?
Probably not.
Denise had no ego. She considered Denise Le Brun the least interesting topic to talk about over a glass of wine. To get her to share titbits about her astonishing life was not easy.
It was a case of oh that was then, this is now. Asked whether she would write her memoirs she said she was far too busy enjoying her retirement.
Sometimes, if gently pushed, a pearl would come out such as the memory of growing up in German Occupied Paris having the baguette you were sent out to buy snatched from under your arm, of being ten years old, playing classical piano for Maîtrise Radio France, a prestigious music training school, of the shock horror from some family members when she became a cabaret singer in the Moulin Rouge, of buying a tiny pied a terre in Paris before making her solitary way to New York.
Making her way sums it up.
This quintessential Parisienne with the beguiling heart shaped face who was still in her early twenties, had never been outside France and spoke no English.
Denise opened for her friend Jacques Brel many times, the last being in Israel in 1963.
He retired from performing in 1966, but in 1968 became famous in America through the Revue Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris.
Denise was the star.
She went on tour in Boston, San Francisco, The Dunes, Las Vegas, Dallas and Houston, Texas. In between American gigs, Denise wowed Canada, South Africa, Australia, Ireland, Holland, Denmark and Israel.
In 1973, she met the American pianist, Paul Dupree in Houston, Texas during rehearsals for the Show. It was a perfect match. Denise said: ‘My music is not written … Paul most of the time improvises…’ The production was the longest-run in Houston history.
Looking for somewhere with an easy commute to her studio in Paris Denise spotted an ad. in Le Figaro with details of a house in rue Manuel, Amboise. She and her husband Jack arrived at the station, walked over the bridge and saw the Chateau. They, like so many of us, were speechless and like so many of us, never tired of the view. They settled here in 2004.
In February 2007 Denise was in Los Angeles with Paul rehearsing their last Show together in St. Patrick Performing Arts Center, Chicago.
Paul shared some of her emails winging back and fore Amboise which demonstrate her self-deprecating humour.
For the title Denise said how about ‘Piaf, Brel and Denise Le Brun Coming Back From The Dead’.
She wrote to the Promoter: ‘A friend of mine is offering to stand at the streets corners to sell tickets. Maybe I could stand next to him, and give a sample of my future show to passers-by.
We need to know whether some people remember me...surely, if a guy from Turkey remembers me and writes about me in the Turkish Readers Digest some people in your town (Chicago) can remember too. Unless the Chicago weather freezes the brains.
In another email to him she said she had better make an appointment with a plastic surgeon for a face lift...unless he wanted her to sing back stage.
Denise was, as usual, a hit. This was the Press Release (my edit).
‘French born Denise Le Brun starred in the legendary Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris...at Chicago’s Happy Medium Theatre for over 400 performances.
She comes to Saint Patrick Performing Arts Centre for one performance only in DENISE LE BRUN revisits BREL, PIAF and LIFE...accompanied by Paul Dupree, Ms. Le Brun’s long-time accompanist/musical arranger, it features the best of Jacques Brel and Edith Piaf...Who better to interpret the songs of Brel than someone who toured with him, or the music of Piaf than her personal friend.
Singer/actress Denise Le Brun has toured America coast-to-coast.
In Chicago, she starred in the title role of Irma, La Douce, the musical Bravo!, A Musical Portrait of Edith Piaf at the Apollo Theatre. At the Philip Lynch Theatre she played the role of Georges Sand.
Highlights of her American engagements include the Houston Grand Opera production of The Three Penny Opera in the role of Jenny, Weill Women at Theatre 3 in Dallas, One Woman Shows at the Alley Theatre, Houston, at the Mayfair Theatre, Los Angeles, Chicago's Park West and The Production Company in New York.
In Houston she also starred in musicals for Theatre Under The Stars.
Her television special Piaf, Brel and Le Brun was produced and telecast nationally by PBS.
Le Brun was cited for her ‘Outstanding Performance’ by the Dallas Theatre Critics Forum and named ‘Favorite Actress’ for her work at Theatre 3 in a review of Kurt Weill songs, Weill Women.
She has participated in numerous concert tours throughout Europe, and has appeared on television in Paris, Berlin, Munich, Brussels, Rome and Geneva. Le Brun has recorded several albums for Polydor* PBS and an album of poetry for Le Chant Du Monde’ (Press Release ends).
On a beautiful, warm, autumn day in 2023, Denise was hostess at her send off in the Grille Dorée cemetery in Amboise. At her request guests were served fine champagne as they listened to her recordings of Jacques Brel songs.
There was not a dry eye in the House during her poignant rendering of If We Only Have Love.
What a loss.
What a force of nature.
Thank you Denise.
Post by Pamela (BA History of Art).
Hear Denise sing with Didier Boland and his orchestra via Youtube.
