French music and fashion icon Francoise Hardy dies aged 80

French singer Francoise Hardy, one of France’s most successful pop stars, has died aged 80.

Her death was reported by her son, Thomas Dutronc, who wrote “Maman est partie,” (in English, “mum is gone”) on social media alongside a baby photo of himself and Hardy.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Thomas Dutronc (@thomas.dutronc)

Hardy had been ill for some time before her death, revealing in 2004 that she had been diagnosed with lymphatic cancer.

In 2015, she was briefly placed in an induced coma after her condition worsened, and had issues with speech, swallowing and respiration in the years since.

The artist was born in the middle of an air raid in Nazi-occupied Paris in 1944, and raised in the city by her mother.

Hardy came onto the music scene in 1961 after signing with Disques Vogue. Her breakout as a musician came in 1962 with ‘Tous les garçons et les filles’. The single sold more than 2.5m copies and topped the French charts, as did early singles 'Je suis d’Accord' and 'Le temps de l’Amour'.

Inspired by the French chanson style of crooned ballads as well as Elvis Presley, Cliff Richard and other American and British stars on Radio Luxembourg, the singer became a key part of the yé-yé style that dominated mid-century French music.

Her most famous songs include 'Le temps de l'amour', ‘All the girls and boys’, ‘Tous les garçons et les filles’, ‘Comment te dire adieu’ and ‘Mon amie la rose’.

The artist’s style captivated fashion designers, she became a muse to designers including Yves Saint Laurent and Paco Rabanne. Designer Rei Kawakubo even named Comme des Garçons after Hardy’s song ‘Tous les garçons et les filles’.

Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger once famously called her the "ideal woman", while fellow singer-songwriter Bob Dylan penned several love letters to her, addressing her by name in a poem on the back of his 1964 album Another Side of Bob Dylan.

Hardy was also an actor, appearing in films by Jean-Luc Godard, Roger Vadim, John Frankenheimer.

“I was very naïve and a well-brought up young woman,” Hardy told the New York Times in 2018, describing her film career. “I couldn’t see how I could turn down offers by well-known film directors. However, I far preferred music to cinema. Music and chanson allow you to go deep into yourself and how you feel, while cinema is about playing a part, playing a character who might be miles away from who you are.”

In 2008, Hardy released her autobiography Le désespoir des singes... et autres bagatelles (translated into English as The Despair of Monkeys and Other Trifles) which became a bestseller in France, selling over 250,000 copies.

She continued writing fiction and non-fiction novels, publishing her first novel L'amour fou in 2012, followed by Avis non autorisés, Un cadeau du ciel, and most recently Chansons sur toi et nous, which compiles all of her song lyrics and contains commentary on them.

In 2018, after enduring a further series of health issues, Francoise Hardy made what turned out to be her final comeback issuing a new album Personne d’autre, her 28th.

She was married once, to singer Jacques Dutronc, with whom she had her son Thomas. They separated in the late ‘80s, but she would often refer to her ex-husband as the love of her life. She is survived by him and their son.