Photo: Barb Jung, first lady of cabaret of the United Kingdom. Barb was the first chanteuse to incorporate Bob Dylan, Jacques Brel and her own songs into an international illustrative cabaret act. In addition, she added British humour, mimic images and nostalgic-poetic ambiance to a quasi comi-tragic show.
HOW WOULD YOU DEFINE A CABARET CHANTEUSE?
According to the American cabaret goers, critics and cabaret artists, Edith Piaf is the godmother of cabaret. The ultimate figure of a super CABARET DIVA. How wrong they are! For, Piaf was never considered by the French as a cabaret singer! Besides, she never performed on stage as a cabaret singer or as a cabaret-entertainer. Also, she never starred in any musical or a cabaret picture. Would you still call her a cabaret star, the same way you call Susan Egan, Julie Andrews and Liza Minelli? How would you define the stardom status and category of a cabaret star in the United States? Does she have to star in a major cabaret motion picture, take the lead of a cabaret show on Broadway, perform at Pizza on the Park or at Le Moulin Rouge? Or it would be enough to sing intimate cabaret songs in a cozy and "intimate" small cabaret-night club room? Does the repertoire of songs chosen by a cabaret singer establish the definition and characteristic nature of an "Authentic Cabaret"? Who is more of a cabaret songwriter, Cole Porter, Weill, Aragon, Prevert, Jean Cocteau, or Jacques Brel, Gilbert Becaud, Jean Constantin? Would you consider Berlin, Joplin, Sondheim, Armstrong, Al Jolson, Louis Prima as authentic as those French cabaret songwriters and composers who wrote the songs of Piaf, Patachou, Mistinguet, Josephine Baker, Line Renauld, Jocelyne Jocya, Juliette Greco, Catherine Sauvage, Maurice Chevalier, Charles Trenet, Damia, and Lucienne Boyer? Especially, when it comes to the true essence and spirit of a traditional Parisian Cabaret, or a 1920's or 1930's Berlin original Kabaret? I doubt it.
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