Ensemble Contraste

Cynthia Abraham, vocals 
Juliette Weiss, double bass 
Arnaud Thorette, viola 
Johan Farjot, piano and presenter

Sixty years after her death, Marilyn Monroe remains one of the most famous figures of the 20th century. An actress, singer and symbol of Hollywood, she was also a performer deeply committed to American popular music, drawing her repertoire from Broadway musicals, the cinema and the Great American Songbook.

The Ensemble Contraste and singer Cynthia Abraham invite you to rediscover Marilyn through the songs that shaped her career, her era and her legend. From iconic numbers such as ‘I Wanna Be Loved by You’ and ‘My Heart Belongs to Daddy’ to the great melodies of Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern and Jimmy Van Heusen, the programme traces the journey of an artist who rubbed shoulders with the greatest figures in American entertainment.

The concert also evokes the world in which Marilyn moved: the jazz clubs of Los Angeles and New York, the links between Hollywood and the Great American Songbook, the place of jazz in 1950s America, as well as the artists she admired or socialised with. The inclusion of ‘Lullaby of Birdland’ thus evokes the vibrancy of modern jazz, whilst ‘Saint Thomas’ pays tribute to Sonny Rollins, one of the giants of the American saxophone. The programme concludes with ‘Fly Me to the Moon’, a song that became one of the symbols of triumphant America in the early 1960s.

The tracks are presented and placed in their historical and cultural context, blending anecdotes, music and American history.

Program :

I Wanna Be Loved by You — Harry Ruby
Lullaby of Birdland — George Shearing
River of No Return — Lionel Newman
I've Got You Under My Skin — Cole Porter
My Heart Belongs to Daddy — Cole Porter
Incurably Romantic — Jimmy Van Heusen
Syracuse — Henri Salvador
After You Get What You Want, You Don't Want It — Irving Berlin
A Fine Romance — Jerome Kern
Saint Thomas — Sonny Rollins
Fly Me to the Moon — Bart Howard