Jacques Brel

He developed a romantic relationship with actress and dancer Maddly Bamy in 1972 which lasted till his death in 1978.

By 1973, Brel became aware that he was ill. Soon he was diagnosed with an advanced stage of lung cancer. Hoping to make the best of his remaining life, he began spending more time sailing and travelling. He also took advanced flying lessons.

Jacques Romain Georges Brel was born on 8 April 1929 in Schaerbeek, Brussels, into a well-to-do bourgeois family. His parents were Élisabeth and Romain Brel. His father worked for an import-export firm, and later became co-director of a company that manufactured cardboard.

He went to a Catholic primary school, École Saint-Viateur, and was also a member of the local Cub Scouts troop.

He started attending the Institut Saint-Louis at rue du Marais in 1941. He displayed a talent for writing and did well in history and French though he performed poorly in other subjects.

As a teenager, he wrote short stories, poems, and essays, and also developed an interest in music. He began playing the guitar in 1944 and soon formed his own theatre group with friends and began writing plays. He fared badly in his studies and failed in many exams.

He started working in his father’s cardboard factory in 1947. The routine job, however, proved to be too boring for the creative 18 year old and he proceeded to enlist for military service in 1948.

Following a short military stint, he began writing songs and performing them at family gatherings and in Brussels' cabaret circuit. His family thought his lyrics were too controversial but Jacques persevered and soon began to gain some popularity.

He moved to Paris in search of better career prospects. During his initial months in France, he found work on the cabaret circuit at venues such as L'Écluse, L'Échelle de Jacob, and in Jacques Canetti's cabaret Les Trois Baudets.

By the mid-1950s, he was a minor celebrity in France. He also began recording albums and his second album, ‘Quand on n'a que l'amour’, released in 1957 won him a prestigious award which added to his popularity.

He toured extensively all over the world during the 1950s. Considered an international singing sensation by now, he was invited to the end-of-year concert at the renowned Bobino in Paris in 1959. The concert was an enormous success.

His song ‘Amsterdam’ is considered one of his most enduringly popular works. A melancholy song, it is about the lives of the sailors on shore leave in Amsterdam and about their day-to-day struggles.

Jacques Brel directed the 1973 Belgian-French comedy film ‘Far West’ which is about a 40 year old man who attains a superpower. The movie was nominated for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.