François Marie Béranger was born on 28 August 1937 in Amilly, a village where his maternal grandparents lived, near Montargis, in the Loiret region. François's parents lived in Suresnes, in the western suburbs of Paris, not far from the Renault car factory in Billancourt. It was there that André Béranger worked as a turner on the factory floor and earned a reputation as a militant trades unionist. As for François's mother, Jeanne, she worked from home as a dressmaker. The factories were destroyed by bombs during the war. And when André returned from the army the family moved to a 'hôtel particulier' in Boulogne where he set up a local youth centre and became an active member of the French Resistance. His involvement in politics continued after the Liberation when he was elected to the French National Assembly as an MP.

Meanwhile, young François was plodding away at his school studies, making a good average in his grades. But he went on to shine at a local Parisian grammar school where he came top of his class. François looked to have a promising student career ahead of him but he suddenly made an abrupt about-turn, abandoning his studies to throw himself into 'real life' instead. Following in his father's footsteps, he became a conveyor belt worker at the Renault car factory where his father, who had grown weary of politics, had returned to work as a managing director.

Joining the proletariat was all very well in theory, but in practice this proved to be quite another story altogether – especially for a young man who had attended a grammar school and studied Latin and Greek. Unable to find his place amongst the workers at Renault, François left after only a short time on the factory floor and went off to join amateur theatre troupe, La Roulotte. It was here that he expressed his artistic talents for the first time, singing and accompanying himself on guitar. The troupe toured extensively in France and, once they had got enough money together, began travelling in Europe, too. After a mini-tour of Greece in 1958, François was called up to do his military service and, like most young men of his generation, was shipped off to Algeria to serve in the army there. He was assigned a post in signals and remained deeply affected by the nineteen months he spent working on the military airwaves, being fully aware – as so few other people were at the time – of the French army's (long covered up and denied) practice of torture.

One brief moment of happiness lightened this difficult time in François's early life, however, and that was when he took advantage of a period of leave to marry his girlfriend Martine (already pregnant with the couple's first child). François turned up to attend the birth of his daughter, Emmanuelle, at the end of 1960, but he soon found fitting back into civilian life was no easy business. Thanks to a few well-placed contacts, François went on to join all-powerful French broadcasting company the ORTF where he worked as a floor manager, producer and producer-in-chief. With a second child, Stéphane, expanding the family at home and things going well at work, François appeared to be settling down. But the events of May '68 were to cause a profound shake-up in his world.

Despite, at the age of 31, being somewhat older than most of the May '68 revolutionaries who took to the Paris streets, Béranger was totally caught up in the fight for freedom. Inspired to get out the old guitar from his Roulotte days, he began writing songs that captured the spirit of the times and regularly sat round playing them to friends. One friend had the bright idea of passing on a cassette of the songs to a prominent artistic director at CBS. Impressed by what she heard, the latter signed the young unknown on the spot, offering him a five-year recording contract.

In 1969, François Béranger went on to release a ground-breaking single entitled Tranches de vie (Slices of life). The single, featuring one long song that took up both the A and the B side, railed against the censors and the general lack of freedom that was holding back the nation's youth. Béranger's debut album was released the following year. Besides featuring Natacha, one of the biggest hits of his career, this first album also included songs about the revolution in Prague, his years on the road with La Roulotte and other fervent cries against injustice. The album proved to be a big hit with the critics and went down extremely well with the record-buying public, too.

François Béranger's popularity in the French music world was cemented in 1971 when he was invited to support Gilles Vigneault at Le Bobino in Paris. Later that year Béranger moved away from the mainstream, however, with Ça doit être bien, a rather disconcerting new album on which he was accompanied by a group of experimental American musicians known as Mormos. His record company did not appreciate this change in musical direction and, by mutual agreement, his recording contract was terminated shortly afterwards. Béranger's second album did not follow in the successful footsteps of the first, but the singer found himself in great demand on the live circuit nevertheless. And he soon began touring up and down the country with a new group called Electrogène.

Following his amicable divorce with CBS, Béranger's third album came out on the Escargot label in 1974. This third opus, which sought inspiration in world folk music, featured tracks such as the Argentinian-flavoured Tango de l’ennui and the song Rachel which danced along to traditional Gypsy rhythms. Shortly after this, Béranger met French guitarist Jean-Pierre Alarçen, who was to become an inseparable companion over the next five years. Teaming up with Gérard Cohen (on bass) and Michel Bonnet (on drums), the pair recorded Le Monde bouge, a fourth album featuring all four musicians' names and photos on the cover. Béranger soon took to the road with his music 'dream team', playing over a hundred dates a year. Despite the fact that Béranger was blacklisted from French radio and TV (his openly anti-establishment songs sounding way too provocative to producers' ears), his concerts proved to be a huge sell-out success.

François Béranger followed this stint on the road with a fifth studio album, Alternative, featuring a track called Paris-Lumière (which took up a full 19 minutes on the flipside). Béranger's collaboration with Jean-Pierre Alarçen was proving to be an extremely fruitful partnership and, in 1977, a live album followed, which included feistier electric versions of many of Béranger's earlier hits. A new studio album, Participe Présent, was released in 1978. A shake-up in musical direction came later that year, however, when, after a final series of concerts at the Elysée-Montmartre in Paris, Alarçen left to set up his own group. Many Béranger fans regretted the guitarist's departure.

Béranger returned to the music spotlight in 1979 with a new album, Joue pas avec mes nerfs. The album, which featured arrangements by Bertrand Lajudie, spawned a single that would become the biggest hit of Béranger's career, Mamadou m’a dit. Meanwhile, Béranger was busy setting up an organisation to help immigrant African workers get back to creative work. Media interest was stirred anew in 1980 with the release of Article sans suite, an album of experimental "flow" tracks.

Things seemed to be looking up for those with Leftist ideals when François Mitterrand became French president. But Béranger became rapidly disenchanted with the new Presidency and, in 1982, he recorded the provocative Le changement c’est quand (When Will Change Come?) which featured on a new album that slipped out practically unnoticed on his new (and short-lived) record label RCA.

Béranger performed at the annual "Printemps de Bourges" festival in 1982. But then, suffering major fatigue and burn-out from the non-stop tour schedule he had kept up over the last twelve years, the singer bid adieu to the live circuit and took a long break from the music scene. Béranger had been a great fan of flying for many years and he took advantage of his new-found freedom to take flying lessons and get his pilot's licence. After a seven-year break, Béranger finally returned to the music scene in 1989 with a tenth studio album entitled Dure Mère. Following the release of the album, fans flocked to see him in concert on his comeback tour.

Throughout his career Béranger remained firmly on the fringes of the musical mainstream, refusing to enter the system he denounced in his songs. Béranger became disillusioned with the music industry once again when his new record company was bought out by a major label. But then he met Antoine Crespin from the label Futur Acoustic, who offered him the chance to re-release all the albums he had recorded up to that point (many of which had become impossible to find in record stores). Crespin also arranged for the release of an EP featuring four songs from Béranger's album Da capo (which had come out practically unnoticed in 1982).

The last slices of life

In 1997, François Béranger was back on the scene with a new music team led by Argentinian pianist and arranger Lalo Zanelli. Following the release of a new album, Béranger made his Paris comeback on stage at Le Trianon in November '97. He then embarked upon an extensive tour, going on to record a live album the following year.

In the course of his career Béranger made a name for his angry outbursts against injustice (Canal 19, Je ne veux pas le savoir and Combien ça coûte), but he also recorded a series of softer, tender ballads (Pour ma grand-mère, Natacha and Départementale 26). In 2002 the singer recorded what was to be his last album, Profiter du temps, an album featuring a collection of highly personal songs. He then gave his final performance in Paris at Le Limonaire, before finally succumbing to cancer and passing away at his home in Sauve, in the south of France, on 14 October 2003.

In 2003, an album entitled 19 chansons de Félix was released posthumously on the Leclerc label. All of François Béranger's albums have now been re-released and this legendary artist's songs are enjoying new success with the younger generation (c.f. Sanseverino's recent cover of Tango de l’ennui).

July 2004