The Nicolas Montier Trio has invited special guest Pierre Charial for an unbelievable album featuring jazz played on a barrel-organ... and the result swings with determination in the hands of these four great instrumentalists. The incredible street-organ sound of Pierre Charial here joins the jazz trio led by Nicolas Montier (alongside Stan Laferriere & Pierre Maingourd), in a repertoire of original tunes and standards. They provide a feast of imperial choruses in a set that alternates between the old world and the new... Benjamin GOLDENSTEIN & Patrick FReMEAUX

“Since the appearance of Benoit Blue Boy’s first LP for Vogue in 1978, he’s released some fifteen albums where “Petits Boogies” and “Blues au bout d’mon lit” have slipped in the “Porte en arriere” to celebrate his idea of French Speaking Blues. For Franck Goldwasser, on the other hand, the blues played on the West Coast had nothing French about it at all. For the first time, the former Parisianturned- pure-west-coast-bluesman drops his English and resorts to his native tongue.” Stephane COLIN

I discovered rebetiko in 1983 when I went to Turkey to present my film Les Princes". The music developed in the slums of Athens and Thessaloniki, and then moved into the islands when Ataturk chased the Greeks out of Turkey. There is never any anger in this music; but you can hear revolt and melancholy, as in all the music I love. It's music for the unpopular, but people who are proud to be what they are. It's subversive music… The lyrics in rebetiko songs are words that can cure (…) Leaving your own country can be positive: new horizons, another way of living together… What I like about rebetiko is the assembly inside, West and East. That's where I come from: West and East have been inside of me since I was born." Tony GATLIF After his "Geronimo", an admirable portrait of the tense relations between traditional culture and urban identity, filmmaker Tony Gatlif has now given us Djam, a masterful original soundtrack devoted to the music known as rebetiko. The humanity behind this popular music of Greek origin, a music of exile, migration and the cultural mix, stems from its origins in the region that ties Europe to Asia, a giant crossroads for migrating civilisations and historically a region of economic crisis. It is the centre of the world. Tony Gatlif is a filmmaker who symbolizes rhythm and liberty, and music is a central element in his filmography, with one Cesar Award already for ""Gadjo Dilo"" and another for ""Vengo"". His music in Djam follows the initiatory voyage of the heroine from Istanbul to Mytilene on Lesbos, and in turn its melodies breathe whisps of drunkenness, emotion and jubilant frenzy.

Fremeaux (Pithys) and Jean-Louis Etienne present “Greenland” the sound of the most important natural park in the word. A pure sound in the midst of infinite silence.

These are the first recordings that Rapha�l Fa�s devoted to flamenco, and his double album is today a reference. Fa�s, a virtuoso guitarist in his own right, was close to the genre's master, Paco de Lucia, and this set marked the first signs of what would become Rapha�l's own signature: he used a plectrum to play delicate yet powerful phrases. Here he made flamenco's sources his own while revisiting the classical guitar as well as it's flamenco and gypsy jazz siblings. He left his definitive imprint on the flamenco repertoire in opening the way, with a personal "Impression of Andalusia", to a mixed-origin ornamental perspective that he has continued to shape for more than 20 years.

When Raul Barboza first settled in France in 1987, he quickly came to the realization that he could not classify himself in any musical genre. The Buenos Aires born accordionist's music represented a unique global mix of Indian, European and African influences, incorporating everything from tangos to mazurkas and waltzes. The recipient of a Konex Prize as one of the five Best Figures in the History of Argentinean Popular Music, Barboza continues to explore new paths on his latest recording, on which he partners with Argentine classical guitarist Juanjo Dominguez.

It is not insignificant that the great sociological figures of the 20th century, Durkheim, Mauss, Levi-Strauss or Bourdieu were initially formed to philosophy. At first, timidly, then fiercely, sociology, or anthropology and ethnology, took over the course of the century their independence from philosophical paternity to create the new denomination of the social sciences. Reflection moves from the individual to the collective, from the metaphysical concept to the observed fact: methodology, research objects or social role, everything has to be invented. Johann Michel, Doctor of the EHESS in philosophy and associate of political science, unfolds the common sources, conceptual filings and latent rivalries of philosophy and social sciences.

“The first French singer-songwriter you could call genuinely inspired by jazz was this boy named Charles Trenet [...] the new heartbeat, the extraordinary joie de vivre coming from the songs that this rumpled kid chucked out by the dozen, were born of the conjunction between a remarkable poetic gift and the vitality of jazz, assimilated fully by an exquisite sensibility.” Boris VIAN (En avant la Zizique)

"The "Album d'Or de la Biguine" had considerable success throughout the Caribbean with its selection of dance-music from Guadeloupe; its recordings of this heritage used Sixties- & early Seventies-studio technology that was quite superior to the material used to produce the 78's of previous decades. This record became a cult biguine-album for the new generation." Patrick Fremeaux

With a carefree lust for life and pleasure matched only by her talent, Francoise Sagan was a writer with a demonic reputation. She was one of the greatest French authors of the 20th century — she wrote “Bonjour tristesse” — yet her contributions to music remain little-known. Olivier Julien has written a fullydocumented 28-page booklet for this set detailing her artistic collaboration in 1950/1960 with the gifted arranger and film-music composer Michel Magne. CD1 presents songs performed by the duo’s entourage featuring Juliette Greco, Mouloudji, Annabel, or Sagan herself; and CD2 is an opportunity to (re)discover “Le rendez-vous manque”, a striking ballet with a libretto by Sagan whose music lies between jazz, rumbas and great instrumentals, presented here for the first time on CD. Patrick FReMEAUX

Thanks to Be-Bop-a-Lula, Gene Vincent and his group The Blue Caps became rock’s champions. Their first recordings featuring the dazzling guitarist Cliff Gallup can be found here in a jumping blues, rock ‘n’ roll and hillbilly anthology which communicates all their incomparable energy and magic. These raw, uncompromising titles represent the very essence of pure rockabilly, the genre they largely contributed to create. Patrick FReMEAUX

A conference organized by « Le Monde » with the Fnac. With Jean Daniel, founder of “Le Nouvel Observateur” and editorialist, Bernard-Henri Levy, Philosopher and Michel Onfray, Philosopher. Fifty years after his death Albert Camus’ political and philosophical heritage is at his climax. Three major intellectuals of our time discuss this legacy. In French.

“All this leaves a huge impression [...] Jazz turns to blues, swing meets class and the music grabs you... whether you turn the sound up or not, don’t hesitate!” Christophe Mourot (about “Drifting Blues”), SOUL BAG

Recorded in April 1937, the saxophone quartet led by Coleman Hawkins was to be the first record released on the Swing label of Charles Delaunay (the son of the painters Sonia and Robert Delaunay). Taking advantage of the presence American jazzmen in town for the 1937 International Exhibition in Paris, Charles Delaunay was a catalyst for all kinds of encounters and mixtures between jazz on the Old and New continents, and he captured them on disc for posterity, making them references in the French recording-industry. The launching of one of the greatest success-stories in pre-war French recording- history is presented by Pierre Lafargue in a 3CD anthology with a detailed 36-page booklet. Benjamin GOLDENSTEIN & Daniel NEVERS

The whirling twisting music form known as Klezmer, which originated among the Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe, can have a sad or festive climate. Here it has all the sweat of a swing club in Harlem during the Depression, as the Gefilte Swing band, led by Alexandre Litwak, plays it's own festive brand of jazz that borders on world music, with occasional forays into the world of pop. They nonchalantly borrow from the zoot-suit subculture with a shameless desire to live for swing and the result is hedonistic, generous and invigorating. And like the Carte de S�jour group in the 80's, they also have their own version of Douce France, which Charles Trenet wrote during the war, only this time it's sung in Yiddish.