Joe Dassin
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| Joe Dassin | |
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Joseph Ira Dassin |
| Born | November 5, 1938 Brooklyn, New York, United States |
| Origin | New York City |
| Died | August 20, 1980 (aged 41) Papeete, Tahiti, French Polynesia |
| Genres | Chanson French pop |
| Occupations | Singer-songwriter |
| Years active | 1966–1980 |
| Labels | CBS Records |
Joseph Ira Dassin (November 5, 1938 – August 20, 1980), more commonly known as Joe Dassin, was an American singer-songwriter best known for his French songs of the 1960s and 1970s.
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[edit] Biography
Joe Dassin was born in New York City to American film director Jules Dassin (1911 - 2008) and Béatrice Launer (1913–2005), a New-York-born violinist, who after graduating from a Hebrew High School in the Bronx studied with the British violinist Harold Berkely at the Juilliard School of Music.[1] Both parents were Jewish. His father was of Russian and Polish Jewish extraction, his maternal grandfather was an Austrian Jewish immigrant, who arrived in New York with his family at age 11.[2]
He began his childhood first in New York City and Los Angeles. However, after his father fell victim to the Hollywood blacklist in 1950, he and his family moved from place to place across Europe.
Dassin studied at the International School of Geneva and the Institut Le Rosey in Switzerland, and graduated in Grenoble. Dassin moved back to the United States where he earned a doctorate in ethnology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
He moved back to France where he worked as a technician for his father and appeared as an actor in supporting roles in a number of movies directed by his father, including Topkapi where he played the role of "Josef".
On December 26, 1964, Dassin signed up with CBS Records, making him the first French singer to sign up with an American record label.
By the early 1970s, Dassin's songs were on the top of the charts in France and he had become very well known in that country. He was also a talented polyglot, recording songs in German, Spanish, Italian and Greek, as well as French and English.
Dassin married Maryse (whose real first name is Yvette) Massiéra on January 18, 1966, in Paris. Their son, Joshua, was born two and a half months before term, September 12, 1973, and died 5 days after. Devastated, Joe and Maryse split, but did not divorce until 1977.
On January 14, 1978, Joe married Christine Delvaux in Cotignac (Var). They had two sons, Jonathan (born September 14, 1978) and Julien (March 22, 1980). Christine died in December 1995.
Joe Dassin died of a heart attack during a vacation to Tahiti on August 20, 1980. He is survived by his two sons, both living in France, as well as his two younger sisters, Richelle (b.1940) and Julie (b.1945). His body is interred in the Beth Olam Mausoleum section of Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood, California.
[edit] Discography
| Album | Year | Songs |
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| Je change un peu de vent | 1964 |
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| À New York | 1966 |
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| Les Deux Mondes de Joe Dassin | 1967 |
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| Les Champs-Élysées | 1969 |
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| La Fleur aux dents | 1970 |
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| Elle était oh!... | 1971 |
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| Joe | 1972 |
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| 13 chansons nouvelles | 1973 |
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| Si tu t'appelles Mélancolie | 1974 |
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| À l'Olympia | 1974 |
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| Le costume blanc | 1975 |
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| Le Jardin du Luxembourg | 1976 |
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| Les Femmes de ma vie | 1978 |
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| 15 ans déjà | 1979 |
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| Blue Country (English version: Home Made Ice Cream) | 1979 |
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| Little Italy | 1982 |
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[edit] References
[edit] External links
- [1], Another French entry
- Joe Dassin at the Internet Movie Database
- 1938 births
- 1980 deaths
- American expatriates in France
- American folk guitarists
- American Jews
- American male singers
- Songwriters from New York
- Deaths from myocardial infarction
- French-language singers
- French people of American descent
- French people of Russian descent
- French people of Polish descent
- Jewish singers
- People from New York City
- University of Michigan alumni