Celine Dion_Hymne à l'amour

Céline Dion stopped the world in its tracks with her rendition of “Hymne à l’amour” at the conclusion of the Paris Olympics' 4-hour Opening Ceremony in Paris the evening of Friday, June 26, 2024. The first floor of the Eiffel Tower served as a fitting pedestal for the coronation of the reigning queen of French song. It was a rare public performance by Céline since her diagnosis in 2022 with the life-threatening neurological disease of “stiff-body syndrome.”

The ceremony itself was the spectacular brainchild of artistic director Thomas Jolly, whose earlier work included the revival production of the French rock opera “Starmania,” with music written by Michel Berger and Luc Plamondon. The ceremony’s Parade of Nations occurred, not inside a stadium like every other opening ceremony, but on a flotilla of 100 boats along a 3.7 mile stretch of the Seine river in Paris. The boats threaded their way past riverside music and dance performances staged in 12 historic "tableaux" at historic landmarks in celebration of salient moments and themes in French history. Statues of prominent historical characters lined the riverbanks. In effect, the entire city of Paris became a theatrical "stage" for an expansive rendition of French history in music and dance.

The song’s lyrics were written and performed in 1950 by Edith Piaf with music by Piaf’s lifelong collaborator, composer Marguerite Monnot. Piaf wrote the song in September 1949 to her lover Marcel Cerdan, an Algerian-born French boxer and (briefly) world middleweight champion until June 1949, when he dislocated his right arm in the first round and was defeated by "Raging Bull" Jake LaMotta. Cerdan died in October that year in an Air France plane crash in the Azores while traveling from Paris to New York to visit Piaff and prepare a rematch with LaMotta. Claude LeLouche depicted their relationship in a 1983 film, "Edith and Marcel." The original French lyrics were later adapted to English as "Hymn to Love" (Eddie Constantine) and "If You Love Me (Really) Love Me" (Geoffrey Parsons).

The song unfolds in four stanzas and one final, concluding line. The first and fourth stanzas have 8 lines each, and the two intervening refrains are 6 lines each. The first and fourth stanzas raise hypothetical circumstances while the second and third stanzas draw conclusions. The rhyming scheme of stanzas one and four is AABCDDBB while stanzas two and three are AABDDA.

Le ciel bleu sur nous peut s'effondrer

Et la Terre peut bien s'écrouler

Peu m'importe si tu m'aimes

Je me fous du monde entier

Tant qu'l'amour innondera mes matins

Tant qu'mon corps frémira sous tes mains

Peu m'importe les problèmes

Mon amour, puisque tu m'aimes

J'irais jusqu'au bout du monde

Je me ferais teindre en blonde

Si tu me le demandais

J'irais décrocher la Lune

J'irais voler la fortune

Si tu me le demandais

Je renierais ma patrie

Je renierais mes amis

Si tu me le demandais

On peut bien rire de moi

Je ferais n'importe quoi

Si tu me le demandais

Si un jour, la vie t'arrache à moi

Si tu meurs, que tu sois loin de moi

Peu m'importe si tu m'aimes

Car moi je mourrais aussi

Nous aurons pour nous l'éternité

Dans le bleu de toute l'immensité

Dans le ciel, plus de problème

Mon amour, crois-tu qu'on s'aime?

Dieu réunit ceux qui s'aiment

The blue sky over us can fall down

And earth can also collapse

Little matters if you love me

I don't care about the entire world

As long as love floods my mornings

As long as my body trembles under your hands

Problems matter little

My love, since you love me

I would go to the end of the earth

I would dye my hair blonde

If you asked me to

I would unhook the moon

I would go steal a fortune

If you asked me to

I would deny my country

I would deny my friends

If you asked me to

People can laugh at me

I would do anything

If you asked me to

If one day, life tears you from me

If you die, though you be far from me

Little matters, if you love me

Because me, I will die also

We will have eternity for ourselves

In the blue of great immensity

In the sky, no more problems

My love, do you believe we love each other?

God reunites those who love each other

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Céline Dion: Hymne à l'amour