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BIO

After her triumphant performances in New York, Tokyo, Buenos Aires, and all over the world, Miss Knife now returns for a more intimate show. After singing for a Symphonic Orchestra and a Jazz Quintet, this more close-knit and duo version of her show enables her to cancel her previous irreversible farewells, or perhaps to perform another “last” farewell. She’s thus, reviving her own roots: cabaret, piano, and a close interaction with a live audience, in order to laugh and to cry with an audience that is either discovering or rediscovering her — after having followed her for the past thirty years.

This new version stems from her desire to draw closer to her audience, to interact with them, to play with their complicity.
Her repertoire is also renewed, with songs reminiscent, as always, of the nostalgia of time passing by, the loss of our loved ones, the hard condition of gypsy entertainers, the backstage darkness. Always sentimental, but with the atmosphere of circuses and funfairs, rife with irony about her age and her bygone lovers.

But this show is also a duettist act.

It’s now with Maestro S (also known as Antoni Sykopoulos) that this new cantilena, a more vocal version of it, was masterminded. Closer to Nino Rotta or Michel Legrand than to the complex jazz compositions typical of her previous works.
Maestro S is not only a genius composer and arranger, but also a generous baritone performer. As an actor and pianist, he took part in Olivier Py’s last two creations. He is a perfect match for Miss Knife’s intense femininity. As a duo, their tessituras blend harmoniously, as do the characters they play: the old soprano and the solemn baritone sometimes give the impression of being a very old couple. Together, they sing their lost youth and their vanished glory. But they also renew, as a loving duo, all the lasciviousness of eternal youth.

Some of these songs were taken from previous shows, others were composed specifically for this new adventure. This is a show that has everything to gain by being performed in small venues; but it can also thrive on larger sets, even if the scenery is reduced to a piano and a few feathers.

The entire universe of French songs comes to life during this recital. It would be a mistake to consider it a parody since it was conceived with great sincerity and the profound need to use songs as a way to speak to your mate. A three-minute song can be packed with more philosophy than a long thesis, and its depth is always inversely proportional to its apparent simplicity. Whether we see it as music-hall, cabaret or a recital performance, it remains in many respects a supremely bold and daring risk-taking triple flip in the life of art forms. These two entertainers have skillfully proven, once again, how powerful songs can be, as both a major and minor form of art, difficult and yet casual, splendid and yet simple. And all they will leave on stage are a few feathers from the diva’s glittering costumes, an opera hat forgotten by the piano player, and catchy tunes: what could be simpler, and yet, more magnificent?

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Sophie Hossenlopp
sophie.hossenlopp@visiteursdusoir.com